Victory!

So I may or may not have spent a good chunk of my workday tracking down this dress.


I finally found one in California. (I guess that answers that question. And by "I," I mean the nice lady on White House Black Market's customer service line. After I went out to Union Station at lunch looking for it.)

I spent a lot of time at White House Black Market this weekend. The lady had me trying on everything in the store. Some of it was great, but this dress was my favorite. It was just a tad too small. So I went on a mission--and victory is mine!!

I'm also waiting for this dress to go on sale.


It looks better on me than on that model. But who pays retail? Especially when that retail is$148. (The answers to those questions are me, sometimes and never me.)

In conclusion, shop at White House Black Market. We can be twins. But please don't wear that dress if you're going to two weddings in Raleigh on Oct. 11. Thanks.

P.S. Why is the "cancel" button more prominent than the "upload photo button" on this interface? I canceled my photos like three times. That can't be operator error!

P.P.S. Sorry, Beth of the Lehigh Valley WHBM who spent an hour complimenting me (whether my outfit warranted that or not) and bringing me stuff only to have your commission go to some woman in Cali who just picked up the phone. I owe you one.

Nevermind

I kind of totally love Sarah Palin now.

I'll Miss the Food the Most

Yesterday I met with the gym nutritionist for my complimentary session. She set up a diet for me based on my current weight (130), height (5'6"), body fat percentage (21.2) and my goals. The problem, however, with asking me about my weight loss goals is that they border on disordered.

In my day I had some issues with body image, issues that playing sports (adequately) has mitigated. But you could also make a good argument, as my sister often does, that my devotion to running hasn't so much mitigated my preoccupations as replaced them. But hey, running's healthier than not eating any day.

So now I have a goal to lose 7 pounds (130 is actually my ideal weight) and to drop down to 17% body fat. That's really the kicker. I want to be more muscular. For the exercise component, I'm supposed to lift for 3 hours a week and keep up my running. That's easy enough.

But ugh, the food. She wants me to drink protein shakes and the daily calories on my plan are limited to like 1650, because, as a (mostly) vegetarian, all my proteins have carbs in them, which the software doesn't count. So it looks like I can actually eat about 2,000, but on paper it says 1650, and that's a little daunting.

So I'll take about a week to amass this shit (and a blender, of course) and then it's off to day after day after day of dry tuna and half an English muffin for three meals a day. It's going to be great.

I Just Need a Minute

So, I've been too tired and busy to really be able to blog as much as I've wanted to these past two weeks. Yesterday I was all set to return to blogging with renewed vigor. I have some stories about my weekend, and I'm working on some essays, and I've joined a writer's group (in name only so far), and Jenny Lewis has a new CD, plus I owe you guys a Ben Folds explanation. Nothing that funny, but you know, stuff.

But today I got some pretty sad news. I've had some people tell me they never realized I have a brother because I don't talk about him too much. But I do; he's six years younger than me, so we're not super close anymore, but I still like to think I look out for the kid. And right now my heart is breaking for him.

I never met his roommate Paul, but late last week I got an earful about what a great guy he was and how much Michael liked living with him. I'm sorry for my brother's loss and for Paul's family and other friends, and I just wanted some time tonight to be sad. Tomorrow I'll go back to being a jerk.

Thanks for bearing with me.

So Many Emotions

Ben Folds Five


I'm freaking out. I had no idea this was going on, and therefore totally missed it.

I can't blog right now, but I'm so mad at Ben Folds right now I could scream. If I don't cry about it first.

Awesome

That's Why I Have a Blog

So everyone has been complaining about the end of summer, and I'm no different. But I'll complain for another reason. (Some people have also been complaining incessantly about the Results class schedule, but that's another blog.)

I have to buy a trail light for my bike. Tonight, after a lovely run in the Results HydroWorx pool, I headed home only to find that it was almost too dark to wear my shades. That's bad for a number of reasons: number one, bugs in my eyes; number two, if I had stayed much later, it would have been completely dark, and I don't have a light.

I used to have a light--you're required by law to have one in DC and VA if you ride at night--but a lovely woman broke it when she helped me fix my flat tire. She flipped the bike over while the light was still attached, and it snapped off. At the time I was happy that I didn't have to walk home, but now I kinda miss the stupid light.

Don't get me wrong though, that light was not cutting it. I rode home along a trail, and it gets DARK. Plus I'm riding against traffic on the way home, so the lights of oncoming cars make it hard enough to see. I've almost driven off the trail a few times from darkness or blindness. Really, it's a great trail.

Anyway, my little light, which was totally sweet and bright for its price class, still wasn't bright enough for the deep darkness of the banks of the mighty Potomac. So I need a trail light. And those fuckers are expensive.

So, in conclusion, I'm complaining that I have to drop $200 so that I can continue riding my bicycle to work during these shorter days. At least I don't drive.

Live Blog: My Confinement to the Bathroom

File this one under TMI, and don't say I didn't warn you.

So, last night, before heading out to dinner with some friends at P.F. Chang's (my friends love chain restaurants), Wes asked me, "What are we going to get at P.F. Chang's?" And I enthusiastically responded, "Diarrhea!"

Famous last words, y'all. Unlike my sister (haha) I have a pretty good, well-behaved G.I. system. But running can sometimes really fuck me up. After my first half marathon I literally almost pooped my pants, and I am NOT an elite runner. It wasn't that I was pushing myself so hard, it's just that running jostles your insides, and debilitating stomach cramps snuck up on me after the race, far enough away from a bathroom that disaster seemed imminent.

So sometimes my stomach acts up. It most often happens after really long runs. But this week, the combination of clam chowder for lunch on Friday, clam chowder for lunch on Saturday and a 20-mile run on Sunday seem to have laid me down for the count.

I'm dying. I finished running at like 11:30. It is now 3:09, and I am typing this from the bathroom. The toilet is the only place I can sit upright without getting cramps that send me running back to the toilet. I've been here so long that my foot is asleep. I was gchatting with Kate, so I brought the computer in here with me and figured I may as well blog. Lucky you. I really wish I had my camera in here. I'd post pictures of my vanity--by which I mean the cabinet. A blog about me shitting is enough of an illustration of my self vanity (self vanity?). But I guess it's weird enough that I have my computer with me...

Seriously, thank God we have the internet. Now everyone can suffer with me.

Talk Me Down

So I haven't been able to blog for a few reasons. 1) I was baby-sitting on Wednesday for a small child who said "Helen Mirren can do anything" and his brother who made me watch Derek Jacobi's to be or not to be scene on YouTube and got home really late. 2) My friend is pretty sick, and we went to visit him on Thursday. I got home and passed out almost immediately after finishing my child-size fries and chocolate milk dinner. And 3) I fucking hate Sarah Palin with the burning fire of a thousand suns.

I'm so angry and insulted and stressed about her and the Republican campaign strategies that I can't stand it or organize my thoughts into anything that doesn't turn into a rant. She reminds me of this other "feminist" I knew who wants all the benefits of feminism but never misses a chance to attack other women. I mentioned before that I like to think the best of people, so this strategy of lying and appealing to the lowest common denominator really throws me for a loop. I get physically upset about it. No wonder some people hate affirmative action! (I still like it--otherwise the domestic terrorist Republicans have won.)

But luckily there is a shining beacon of hope. Yesterday, after spending the entire day at my desk, reading story after story about Sarah Palin until I wanted to cry, another Sarah came to my rescue. She's like Haley Joel Osmet in Pay It Forward, and I'm like Jesus on the bridge, and now I'm paying Sarah Haskins forward to you. It might be ok after all.

I'm Watching the Republican Convention

There sure are a lot of white people there. And no, Fred Thompson, despite that hideous fake tan, you do not count as a person of color. Nice try, though.