Snack time

Friday night is usually our date night. I came home tonight and asked Steve if he wanted to go to dinner.

"Sure, but why don't you have a snack now and we'll go later?"

"Because I'm hungry now. Aren't you hungry?"

"No," (sheepishly) "I had a snack."

"Really? Right before dinner?"

"Sorry."

"It's okay. What did you eat?"

(looks at his feet) This is when I remember we made bison burgers for dinner last night.

"Did you eat the left over burgers?"

Nods.

"Both of them?"

"Well...they were kind of small."

"So by, 'I had a snack,' you meant 'I ate dinner.'"

(still looking at feet) "Yeah...I ate dinner."

My husband cracks me up! So I'm currently looking for a "snack," and anticipating a lovely Saturday night out :)

Ambition

I have a dream that someday I'll be one of those women who shows up with amazing homemade goodies for every function they attend (and sometimes for no reason at all). And the recipes will be my own inventions too. For our Primary training meeting tonight, I supplied a bowl of microwave popcorn. I guess I'm not quite there yet.

Up and at 'em

I've been in sort of a winter funk. Haven't worked out, haven't spent much time outside, really haven't felt on top of my game. I can't remember the last time winter got me down so much. But the good news is, I think I've put those winter blues behind me (whether Provo decides to warm up or not)! I got back on the work-out wagon and after a week of depressing, barley-over-one-mile-before-I-think-I'm-going-to-die running, I'm back up to three mile stretches and registered for the Utah Valley half marathon in June. It is a ways from 3 miles to 13, but at least I'm back on track :)

So now I need some assistance. My running tunes have gotten old and I need some new ideas. I like really upbeat music when I work out (Shakira, Abba...you know, stuff that makes you want to move). What do you put on the iPod when you want to step it up?

Ain't nobody gonna slow me down (...oh no, I got to keep on movin...)

Last week, I tried to remove my flash drive from my computer only to get this message:

The device 'Generic volume' cannot be stopped right now. Try stopping the device again later.

You go, 'Generic volume,' I will not try to undermine your awesomeness again. I only wish I were having a day like that.

Confession

I am having a ridiculously lazy Saturday morning. Not just that though, it seems that most of my Saturday (and Sunday) mornings have become absurdly lazy recently. After spending all summer waking up long before dawn to get miles and miles of running in before the sun warmed up, I'm not sure if it's refreshing or disheartening that I've spent most of the winter sleeping in (in a way I haven't done since high school) and then don't seem to get out of my pajamas until I'd normally be thinking about an early lunch. If I'm honest I might admit it would feel less depressing if I were still running miles and miles every week. Sigh. Can anyone guess what my New Year's resolution might be (or had better be)?

What about you? Does anyone have good ideas for getting yourself up and moving even when you know it's freezing outside and the nasty air will probably kill you faster than laziness (and when you also happen to loathe treadmills)? And do you believe in alarm clocks on Saturdays (those of you without children)?

A Chance to Help

I'm grateful this morning that family in Haiti is safe. I'm also touched to be reminded of how in a world that can seem so dark at times, we still stretch our arms around our brothers and sisters in need. Please help as you choose - here are a few ideas.

• From the White House Blog:
  
  For those interesting in helping immediately, simply text "HAITI" to "90999" and a donation of $10 will be given automatically to the Red Cross to help with relief efforts, charged to your cell phone bill.
  
  Or you can go online to organizations like the Red Cross and Mercy Corps to make a contribution to the disaster relief efforts.
  
• LDS Humanitarian Services donation page.

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.