Month: May 2013

International or IHOP?

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A good scenario:  international pancakes while on an international flight Unless you are living under a rock, you have been thinking about your retirement.  Now before you start gasping and screaming at the screen, “Are you serious?   I can hardly figure out my grocery budget AND we’re pregnant AND Petmeds is not covered by my FSA AND my parents might have to move in with us pretty soon, so ….. NO I’M NOT THINKING ABOUT  MY RETIREMENT!”   …..  deep breath….   that’s why I said, “thinking about” not “ready for” … calm down, people! My husband and I were driving our Zipcar one carefree afternoon , when I asked,  “Do you think when we’re old and retired our lives will be more international or more IHOP?”    I like IHOP.  I like their commercials featuring piles of pancakes and efforts to creatively stuff them with sausage or fruit (and in some cases, sausage AND fruit AND cream AND chocolate chips – oy vey!).  I love that it is family and budget friendly.  I love that …

Raising Our Friends, Raising Ourselves

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Nailed it. Cartoon by Mark Stivers I spent the majority of the week visiting with Captain America, an old friend who just settled with her family in the midwest.  The last time I saw her daughter, now an articulate three and a half year old with waist length hair, she was a bald, drooling toddler.  This told me we had to hit the accelerator button on several years’ worth of our usual soul searching and girl talk.  Three nights would be barely enough. Well, who needs to sleep, right?   Give me a tall pitcher of water and a comfy place to lounge and I am good to go for several hours!  There was a lot to share and even more to ponder.  Goals to be made, disappointments to get over, new perceptions made clear and lots and lots of laughs in between. Captain America and I met in college.  We spent many a long night on the phone talking about big dreams for our future careers, dancing in discos while intending to be home by …

Not Havin’ It

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Perfectly illustrated scenario c/o CartoonStock.com If you are married or have been in a committed relationship for quite some time, I beg you to back me here:  Sometimes, he’s just not having it, is he?  And when he’s not having it, you suffer right along with him.  My mom used to complain that my father definitely was going through some kind of male menopause when I was in high school.  Although I heard what she was saying, I did not understand what she could have meant. Flash forward two decades- I. Finally. Get. It.

Just too excited

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How I am feeling…  excited, but a bit crazed!  source:google images   I just started the Alt For Everyone series yesterday and have to say how glad I am to have signed up, even though I am such a freshman (preschooler even) compared to everyone else in attendance.  Well, I need SOMEONE to look up to and SOMETHING to strive towards, so why not play with the big boys and see how I can learn, if not keep up?  Yesterday I learned how to stay organized and how to style nice original photos.  Today I got good tips and networked with some great bloggers I admire at the 8am meet up.It is amazing what happens to a person when an interest is piqued and the fuel to turn it from thought to action starts to kick in.  I sometimes think that all of the ideas and possibilities that go through my head are occasionally to my detriment.   In starting a new plan for my blog, I sit on the couch with my pencils, notebook, and …

No Middle Ground between Oreos and Working Out

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I like yoga.  I really do!  I enjoy a good stretch, getting my oooooommmmm on, and even the trembling of a dormant arm muscle now and then.  I’ve also been known to enjoy higher intensity workouts because they make me feel strong, energized and are AMAZING for the complexion.  Do you know what else I like?  Feeling blissed out after eating a stack of Oreos.  My friends know how much I like cookies, especially the Golden Oreos that didn’t even make it to my photo shoot this afternoon.  Originally there was a really big pile of them for the intended picture for this post, but by the time I got my camera out, there was just a stack of five.  Oops… like I said…   I really like cookies. During a catch up phone call with Dramanut,  I told her I needed to get off the phone after an hour in time to get changed and make it to Burn.  As the minutes flew by between laughs and anecdotes, I said, “Oh, I am going …

Finding My People

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Today as I was heading home, I had the great fortune of running into Ms. Mint. She is someone I have always liked and known for three years through work, but more recently became friends with after a casual instance of small talk one evening revealed we had an important interest in common.  I mean, is there really any other way to make an instant connection than that?  Since we hadn’t seen each other in several weeks, we caught up as quickly as five minutes would allow this afternoon, and talked about getting together next week before parting ways.  I immediately felt really really happy.  I remembered meeting certain other friends for the first time, and how some needed a definite warming up period before hand, while others were straight up laughter, confetti, and banana splits from day one (mutually felt of course).  It’s that synergy that occurs when we find our ‘people’.  So I dedicate today’s Be Happy blog hop to the power of instant connection. As I am writing, editing and rewriting this …

Taking the time to not be so crazy

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Something occurred to me.  I decided to cut back at work, from full time to heavy part time two years ago, and now from heavy to light part time starting this week.  I can’t explain to you what is meant by heavy part time, if only to say, imagine being in the same place you meant to leave in order to get some head space and to make room for big changes in your life, only to still be there, two years later, not doing your old job at 40 hours, but doing bits and pieces of six other ones instead, with the same emotional and mental intensity that burns out your adrenals 30 hours a week.  Imagine self inflicting guilt on yourself to stay.  Imagine a trusted ivy league educated therapist who has worked with you once a week for three years reflecting back to you your own words describing an unconscious desire to move on from this job… but still staying.  Yeah…. crazy. So this week I am giving myself a break and …