Married Mannerisms

"I'm thinking of dying my hair brunette.  Opinions?" Says me


"To match you're eyebrows maybe?" Says husband.

Healthy Living- Running

Confession- I fell off the wagon.

Ironic, since I had literally just written the first Healthy Living post.  I will save the "falling off the wagon and how long it takes to get back to your seat" post for a later date.  Also- I'm hopefully back on the wagon... or atleast trying to catch up with it.

Today's topic- Runners.  I hate them.  I absolutely hate them.  WHY???? you ask...

I'm absolutely putrid green from jealousy.

Runners have small waists.  They have muscular legs.  They can endure all sorts of pain and hardships.  They have a hobby, and most runners are committed to keeping that hobby.  They have great posture.  I have absolutely NONE of that.

I want to be a runner SO BAD!!!!  I've tried for years.  I joined track in middle school, only to find out running caused asthma attacks.  I became a long jumper- a SMALL long jumper (who had zero success).  So I ran in gym in high school.  Once.  A friend of mine convinced me to run 2 miles with him on a track.  I SUCCEEDED!!!!! and nearly died the next day.

I've tried again throughout college.  On a treadmill (Did you know that Cincy is rather hilly?).  I stunk at it!!!  My knees hurt, my ankles hurt.  I finally got that stupid inhaler.  I quit.

I tried again.  This time taking advice from The Biggest Loser Tara Costa (Did you know that I love her?).  Walk 9 min, jog 1.  Repeat 3 to 6 times.  Gradually change the numbers so that you start walking less and jogging more as time goes by.  It worked!  I could do it!!!  Except... I wasn't doing something right.  My hips hurt.  I mean the actual bones in my hips hurt.  It felt like I had no cartilege.  It was extremely painful.  And not a good painful as muscles tend to get from exercising.  It was bone shattering intense pain.  It took over a week to recover.  And by recover I mean walk without wanting to cry.

So, as jealous as I am, I'm afraid I might have to give up on running.  Are any of you guys runners?  How did you get started?  Was it hard to start off?

Weekday Babysitting and working from home

In case I've never told you, I moonlight as a babysitter.  Now that I think about it, that was the part of this weekend I forgot to tell you about!  


So I babysat on Sunday recap for a family that flew in from New York for a wedding.  3 kids with the oldest being 5.  The youngest was a teething 10 month old with an ear infection.  Let's say it was very entertaining.  Great kids, which is always amazing.


Something different this week- I was asked to babysit for a couple hours on Wednesday.  Mom had to leave, but Dad wasn't going to be home in time.  So I went.  The trouble is I had to do some translating work!  My new lesson- working at home with 3 kids!!!!


Firstly- MAJOR kudos to those of you who work from home while being a parent.  How do you do it?  I was there for an hour and didn't get more than a few pages translated.  It was fun, but at the same time a little frustrating.  As a babysitter your job is to play with the kids.  That's all I've ever really had to work on while caring for children.  Obviously keeping the house clean is also on the list, but that's never been hard for me.  But working while sitting?  It was a first.  And not nearly as easy as I had hoped.


But a nice little trick?  Cards!!!!  I taught the 2 youngest the art of war.  They tried slap-jack, but to be honest, the older of the two was a lot faster and hit a lot harder.  It didn't work out as well as War.  


Once again- major kudos to you parents who also work at home.  I'd go nuts within a week.

The Youngest Graduates

Tuesday marked a day in history for my family.  Or at least for my generation in the family.  My youngest cousin graduated from high school.


It's funny.  That big important day in all our lives is a right of passage into the world.  Either we move on to a job or another school, but at this point we are on our own in at least some form.  The responsibilities begin.  Most of us had jobs.  We lived on our own or in a dorm, or a ruddy apartment with 4 boys, ya know... the usual.  We grew up, or we chose to hold off and have some fun see spring break, frat parties, and road trips.  We traveled the world and I'll tell you some other time about Buenos Aires and Mérida, Mexico and Negril, Jamaica.


Do you know how awfully cheesy graduation is?  Ok.  Recap.  You dress all 600 students in the WORST outfits possible.  Why?  To make everyone look bad together?  Then you get the band together to play awful music.  And it doesn't matter how good this band is, because playing in an auditorium like that makes ANY band sound horrible.  Finally, you have a few seniors giving speeches.  Sometimes you get amazing speeches.  Sometimes you have good speeches, but the kids are so nervous you can't understand them.  You listen to adults speak (and some are quite good, like the guy we heard).  Finally they name EVERY STUDENT (we're talking 600 names here.  It took an hour, at least).  What's funny is they ask you to hold your applause, but no one ever does.  Then you wait until your kid walks, and then wait for the rest to finish, all the while finding ways to pass the time.  In our case, we watched the heals on the girls and tried to guess who would trip, because let's face it.  Someone always does, and it's usually the girl with the tallest heals.  In this case, we were correct.  We waited for 599 students to walk before the last one stumbled.  


It's a very important day.  True.  It's crucial.  At that age it is the all important finish line simply because it's the first.  Reaching it is key to having a successful life, honestly.  Yet, it's still extremely cheesy.


I'm still very proud of my cousin.  It was a huge moment, and being close to him I know it meant the world to him.  So, hats off to him.  He made it.

Long Time No See

So, here's a funny thing.  My boring life just got busy!  And I've been MIA on here for 8 days a while.  But here's a thought- I'll post a few blogs every day for a few days to tell you all about it!!!!


So the first big thing on the list this weekend was a going away party for a few friends of ours.  One is moving to Washington DC for a 9 month internship and the other is spending a month in Jordan before starting grad school at the University of Colorado.


It was actually highly entertaining.  We had a Cincinnati themed party DUH!!! So we all ate things like skyline chili, black raspberry chip ice cream from Graeter's, and we all wore our favorite Cincy clothing, such as my totally awesome UC shirt that I completely made out of a huge free tshirt you know, the free ones they shoot into the crowd at sporting events.  I'll try to remember to post a pic sometime.


To top it all off- it was, of course, a surprise.  We caught them completely off guard.  Pics to come


It was a great night, and it was so much fun to go back to that world called "social life".  I have been SO out of the loop lately.  If it weren't for facebook, I'd never know anything going on in my buddies' lives.  So maybe Mike and I need to plan to get together with them more?  I would agree.


Unfortunately, the night ended around 9 when everyone else started to do the usual partying thing.  Mike had to work at 1:30 am, so... ya know... had to get home and get some sleep.


But point being- life is starting up again!  Maybe it has to do more with the fact that summer is back.  I can't tell.  Either way, it makes me happy.