2012 Resolutions

Happy New Year everybody! A new year always means a new beginning, and I feel like 2012 is going to be a great year to just do shit over.

Don't get me wrong, 2011 was bomb. I mean, I graduated from college (Magna Cum Laude, bitches) and got a full-time job in my field of study (tune in to NWCN to see other people read my handy work). Not very many people could say that.

There was other cool stuff I did this past year, but graduating and finding a job were pretty much up there. I guess going to Coachella would round out the top three. Somehow I do not see 2010 me going to Palm Springs for three days to just hang out and listen to a bunch of bands I've never heard of. Now I am hooked on music festivals.

Anywho, no new year can't start without a flaming bag of Resolutions. So without further ado, here is what I resolve to do in the coming year. Note: these are in no particular order. Plus I'm sure I forgot something.

I resolve to:

...go to Barcelona and London. Does it count as a Resolution if you know it's going to happen? Whatever, I don't care. I just wanted another excuse to say that I'm going to Barcelona and London in September. Suck on that!

...stick to my workout schedules. Since I started eating right and exercising more in September, I have never felt better. For the most part, I've really stuck to the workout schedules that I've set out for myself.

Take the Runner's World Magazine Holiday Running Streak. I was supposed to run at least a mile everyday between Thanksgiving and New Year's. Well, it's the day before New Year's and I ran at least a mile every day except for Christmas (and that's only because I felt like I had to puke). Not too shabby. Thanks to that, I can run a 5k in less than a half an hour. I don't think August 2011 Ally would have ever imagined that.

I know that there will be some days that I just won't be able to or won't feel like working out. And that's okay. But as long as I stick to most of my workouts, I'll be happy.

Now I want to do more running. More distance, more speed, and more racing. Which brings me to my next Resolutions...

...run five 5ks. I read a lot of blogs where the writers are always talking about how great road races are. Now, I want to do road races. Since I can already run 3.1 miles with no problems, I want to at least get a cool t-shirt at the end.

I'm sure this one will be easy to do since there are like, a ka-gillion 5k races in Seattle.

...run a sun-1:00 10k. This is the race that I'm starting my training for this week. I know a 10k is not a super challenging distance, but for a girl that until quite recently couldn't run 3 miles without dying, 10k seems pretty effing far.

Plus I figured that if I wanted to start training for races, I'd start out small. I'm not about to start running for a marathon right out of the gate. I'd for sure get burned out and never want to run again. I'm starting to like running (shocking, I know)...I don't want to scare it away.

...run a half marathon. I know I haven't run my 10k yet, but I'm pretty sure that after I tackle that distance, I could totally try for a half-marathon. I'm not sure what kind of time I want to beat...I just want to finish one. Now my only question is whether I can do the Seattle Rock n Roll half in June (just two months after my 10k), or wait until the other Seattle half in November (when the weather is shitty). I'm sure I'll figure it out after I do the 10k.

...clean my room every weekend. This one may be the most important. Ever since I came home, my room has been an effing sty. All my clothes are piled in my papa-son chair and my bed is rarely made (but that's mainly because the comforter is all effed up and all the fluff is at the bottom). Well, it will be like that no more.

Every weekend, I will be sure to tidy up my room so that I don't run the risk of tripping on shoes or a scarf as I get out of bed in the morning.

...connect with friends more. I am really lame at keeping in touch with people. Mainly because I'm lazy or I just forget about them. Out of sight, out of mind. Well, in 2012 I want to hang out more with friends I have in Seattle, and skype more with college friends that live elsewhere.

I'm always complaining that I never do anything. Maybe that's because I never call them to see if they want to get together. I don't want to do that anymore.

...save money better. Now that I have a real-life paying job, I somehow think that's okay to start spending more money than I need to. In 2012, I want to do a better job of budgeting my paycheck and only buy things that I really need.

This pretty much means I should finally set up direct deposit of B of A. Oops.

...eat healthier. This might seem really obvious and cliche, but it needs to be said. I've been eating pretty healthy the last part of 2011, but there definite room for improvement. Here's a more detailed list:

• more lean protein - I really don't get enough chicken, fish, yogurt and other lean protein-y things in my diet. That needs to change if I plan to start running more.
  
• more veggies - By "more" I mean variety. Broccoli and Brussels sprouts are all well and good, but there are so many vegetables out there and all have different nutritional benefits. They need to be in my mouth.
• more whole grains - This doesn't mean I get free-reign to eat a ton of bread, pasta and other useless carbs. I will be eating all of those things, but they have to be the right kind. Whole grains have a bunch of different health benefits, or so I've read. I need more whole grains.
  
• drink more water - Anyone who has seen me over the last few month has also seen a grungy SmartWater bottle attached to my hip (not literally but you get it). I drink a lot of water during the day -- it's my beverage of choice -- but I need to drink more. Experts say you have to drink, like, half your body weight in ounces or something like that. In 2012, I'll try to drink at least 3 SmartWater bottles worth a day.
  
• indulge in moderation - I don't want to be one of those health nuts that never have sweets or anything fatty. I love sweets and fat too much to give them up. I'll just eat them sparingly and in moderation. I can't go through life not having cheesecake.
  

...be friendlier. This is in regards to mild acquaintances or people I meet on the street. Apparently I give off a pissed off vibe when I'm around people I don't really know. Sorry about it, nothing personal. That's just how my face is.

Anywho, I will try to appear more friendly when walking by strangers.

...try not to call my mom every time I have a freak out. While I'm sure my mom loves hearing from me during the day, she's probably not awesome with being my complaints sounding board. Sorry about that. From now on I'll try to figure out problems on my own...or at the very least call someone else and bitch at them.

...blog more. I was on such a roll a few months ago. Then the full-time promotion happened and my schedule made it so blogging was low on the totem pole when I got home...under eating and laying on the couch watching taped Jeopardy! I'll get back to blogging every day, even if some of the blogs don't have pictures in them. I know that's really annoying, but it has to happen. Posting pictures on here is really tasking and bugs me.

...not die in a Mayan-predicted, fiery apocalypse. I'm not really sure how to prevent this from happening, if it is indeed destined to happen. This is just something I really don't want happening to me. F*ck you, Mayans.

That pretty much sums up my goals for 2012. They seem pretty do-able, right? Totally! Anything is do-able if you set your mind to it and all that shit.

Again, have a safe and wonderful new year! I can't wait to go to the gym tomorrow and see all the people that promised to lose weight. That place is going to be packed!

Post-Christmas Haze

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas! I know I certainly did.

I didn't do much blogging, mainly because I was busy spending time with my family instead of constantly being on my computer.

That... and the fact that I was with the only people that actually read my blog. Why write about my experiences when they're there experiencing them with me? That's just redundant.

Long story short about my Christmas morning: I worked from 6am to 2pm all by myself (yep...all alone) writing stories to put on our channel's ticker. It was great (and by great I mean boring) fun. Not a whole lot of news happened for the most part. The biggest thing that happened was a wind storm that picked up around noon that caused some power outages.

Then it was time to go home and join in on the Xmas festivities.

I have to say that I made out like a bandit this Christmas. I got a new pair of Lululemon running pants (for when I start my 10k training) and lots of cool Tupperware items for my packed meals I take to work. Spoiler alert: I used some of them in my lunch and dinner today.

But the present that really sent my Christmas over the top was my new iPhone 4S. Yep, you read that write. My parents got me the new iPhone, with Siri and everything.

I was planning on getting the phone myself using some gift cards and kitty-sitting money, but I was totally shocked when I opened my last present and found the Apple iPhone box. My mom was really clever and put it in a super large box, and even weighed it down with some magazines. She's so sneaky.

The presents I gave out this year were also a big hit. My parents totally love the Keurig coffeemaker I got them. In addition to that, I got them both new coffee mugs to drink their fancy coffee in. My dad got a Dr. Who-themed mug with a TARDIS that disappears when it's touched by hot water (for those who don't know, a TARDIS is a time-and-space-traveling phone booth that's bigger on the inside). For my mom, I got her a customized mug that has a picture of Lionel Messi winking on it.

I'm so effing clever.

I got my grandma some new place mats and napkins. Now she doesn't have to use paper napkins and kill a million trees when she's eating.

After opening the presents, we sat around waiting for our ham to cook and watching Sunday Night Football. Good times.

There was one down-note about my Christmas. After almost 30 days of running everyday, I just could not run on Sunday. I don't know why, but my stomach felt like crap. So much so, that I couldn't even bare the thought of getting on the treadmill for a mile.

I felt kind of bummed that I broke my streak, but I just wasn't feeling well. But at least it made my run on the 26th that much better.

I didn't have to work the day after Christmas, so I had a pretty lazy day. I didn't get to the gym until almost one, but I ran a good two miles with no side aches.

I had to get an Apple Care warranty for my new phone, which meant that I had to go to the Apple store at Bellevue Square to buy it. Oh. Em. Gee. That place was a fricking mad house. Thank Tim Tebow I made a reservation, otherwise I would have been there a long time.

I also got a snazzy new cover to go with my phone. I'd show you a picture, but I'm afraid to peel it off my phone.

After the Apple Store madness, we went to Nordstrom's to see what kind of after-Christmas deals they had going on. I wasn't planning on buying anything, but I ended up getting two shirts and a sweater, all of which I purchased with Christmas and kitty-sitting money.

I then wanted to stop buy a specialty running shop to see what they had in the way of watches and water receptacles for longer runs.

I wanted to get a watch that kept track of how far I was running and how fast I was running. Since I'm starting my 10k training next week, I wanted something that told me my per-mile pace, since I have to stick to the paces the training program assigned me.

The store clerk helped me find a watch that did all those things. Well, it didn't take a lot of searching since it was the last watch they had in the store since all the other ones were bought for Christmas. Duh.

The down-side was that the watch cost $200. That seems a little steep to me, but I also remembered that I didn't have to buy a $200 iPhone in addition to the watch. So I considered myself still in the black.

I also got a belt that holds two little water bottles and has a place to put my phone and keys. Now I won't have to hold on to a water bottle when I got out for my 13 miles runs. That would have been lame. Merry Christmas to me!

After boosting the Boxing Day economy, we went back to the house to eat more Cougar Gold cheese and crackers and watch Monday Night Football. Hot damn that cheese is good. I hate Wazzu, but they really do make the best cheese.

We did some more lounging around and eating -- you know, things everyone does on the holidays. We got to see Drew Brees set the new single-season passing yards record, which was cool. I like Drew Brees. He's a classy guy. But I'm sure it keeps him up at night that he doesn't have a Rose Bowl win thanks to Marcus Tuiasosopo and the UW Huskies.

Yeah...I'm sure he doesn't care that much.

Fast forward to today, when I have to go back to my normal work schedule. Boo.

I got up early enough to see my grandma before my mom took her to the airport. Then I made my lunch and dinner for today, followed by some gym time.

I wasn't planning on running three miles, but I did, because I felt that awesome. And the best part was I didn't have any side aches at all! Win! That makes me even more excited to start my training next week.

After the gym I went back home to find my dad watching some English Premier League -- Swansea vs. QPR. I said he must have been really desperate to watch soccer since I was watching perhaps the two worst teams in the EPL. I think he misses Barcelona games more than I do.

I got to work and it was all pretty ho-hum. A lot of people still aren't in thanks to the holiday. I'm not sure if I like a quiet newsroom. It kind of freaks me out.

For lunch I did have turkey and hummus on a slice of high-fiber bread along with some mango, blueberries and raspberries.

More writing, writing, and writing. I'm kind of looking forward to the return of 15-45s, since it will give me more to do during the work day.

While I was writing for the 6pm show, I had some apple slices with peanut butter. Look at the cool container it's in. It has a place for dips! Yep...I got that for Christmas.

After being totally bored the first two hours of work, the next six seem to fly by. Probably because I had a lot of stories to write.

After the 6pm show aired and I wrote a few stories for the overnight, I had some way left over Trader Joe's cheese ravioli. Still delicious. But I was totally hungry immediately following.

Now it's time to head home. But first I have to stop by the store and buy some essentials for the two-day detox I'm starting tomorrow. I definitely need it after all the holiday goodies I've eaten over the last week.

Let the Vacation Planning Begin!

Last time I blogged, I was having a bit of a freak out over whether or not I would be able to get my vacation time approved.

Well, long story short, I got my vacation time approved! Not to mention yesterday we booked our (first class) flights over to London! Thank the Tim Tebow above for my parents massive amounts of flier miles!

I can say with absolute certainty that my family and I will be in Europe from September 13th through the 27th. As of right now, our only destination is London. We still need to wait until about June/July when the La Liga soccer schedule comes out before we know whether we're heading to Barcelona the first or second week.

Now that our flights are booked, the next hurdle to jump is where we plan to stay. The first decision is whether to go the hotel route, or rent an apartment for the week. Since we don't know which week we'll be in which city, we would have to book a place for two weeks, then reduce the reservation accordingly.

After doing some research, it was much cheaper to rent than to get a hotel room. Plus, with a hotel, the chances of getting a refund once we reduce our reservation from two weeks to one week is pretty much impossible.

At least when renting an apartment, we can communicate with the owner of the apartment and try to work something out.

I searched for apartments on the website airbnb.com. I saw someone recommended the site on a Rick Steves message thread. And since Rick Steves is God, I gave the site a try.

It's actually pretty legit. You type in which city you want to stay in, who long you're there and how many people, and it pops up with a bunch of apartments that you can rent. Some a definitely cheaper than others, but on the most part their cheaper than staying at a hotel.

The best part, I think, about the website is that you can contact the owners of the apartment if you have any questions. I've been telling many of them about my family's scheduling predicament, and many of the owners are quite accommodating. I have a feeling that picking an apartment out of all the options will be the tough part.

There's one apartment in Barcelona that I'm a huge fan of. It's in the Barceloneta neighborhood and it right by the beach. It's big enough to accommodate all three of us. Not to mention that (according to her profile picture) the owner of the apartment is a huge FC Barcelona fan. Win!

I messaged her, so hopefully after the Christmas nonsense gets under control, she will get back to me.

I am just so thrilled that my dream vacation is finally coming together. Only 10 months to go!!!

Off to Christmas Eve mass. My favorite (and only) mass of the year!

Vacation Hold-Up

Let's just dive right into the post, shall we, and deal with all the food and exercise talk later.

Basically, I was all excited going into work because I figured that today would be the day that I can get my vacation request in early (a whole 10 months early, I might add) so that I can get my days reserved for my trip to Barcelona.

However, when 1:30pm rolled around and my EP wasn't in yet (even though he was supposed to), I thought I would have to wait yet another day before I could turn in my request.

Thankfully, he did finally come in around 3pm. Better late than never, I guess. I proudly went up to him and handed him my blue vacation request form. And then he delivered me some upsetting news.

"Yeah, um...we've already had two people makes requests for two week vacations in September and...in my seven years in this business, we have never had everyone get all of their days off. But we'll try to work everything out."

Um...sure...okay.

My first thought was, "Why does the universe not want me to go to Barcelona?" A bit dramatic, I know.

My second thought was, "How early did those people send in their requests, if I sent in mine 10 months in advance?" Apparently with the combination of Olympics and state primary coverage in August and the general presidential election in November, September 2012 seems to be the hot month for vacations. Dammit. And I thought I was getting an early jump on things.

Needless to say I was a little upset that my trip to Barcelona isn't going to way I wanted it to. I know my mom is going to read this and think, "God, Ally! This is what happens when you work in the news business. Get over your damn self!"

To which I reply, "Duly noted. I do realized that I work in an industry where I might not get my vacation days when I want them. I'm just surprised that there would already be competition for vacation in September. Now just let me be annoyed for a bit, and then I'll get over it."

The good news is, after about a half hour of angst, I was over it. If I get the vacation days, great. If I don't, well...that sucks, but it's not like Barcelona is going away anytime soon.

In the end, my EP said he feels confident that I should be able to get the vacay days. Fingers crossed everyone!

Anywho, I had another problem today with scheduling, but this time it didn't have to do with vacation time.

I was checking out my work schedule for the next week to see when I'll be working on New Year's and such. I looked at my schedule on iNews (which is also our writing program) and it said that I wasn't working the day after Christmas...which I have known for several months.

However, when I looked on BeloNet (the website where our schedule will reside after the new year), my schedule said that I was working the day after Christmas...from 4am to noon! Aack!

I emailed my other EP (who was out of the office today) about the matter, and hopefully he'll tell me tomorrow that I indeed don't have to work that day. I mean, I already have to work Christmas Eve and Christmas...and did I mention that I'm working Christmas ALL BY MYSELF!!! I'm literally going to be the only one in the newsroom from 6am to about noon. That's going to be different.

I'll let you know how it all works out.

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Now enough of my schedule complaining. Let's talk about how my morning went, okay?

For breakfast, I had another blueberry waffle...but this time it had sunflower butter spread all over it!


Sunflower butter?!?! What the eff?

Yeah, I know. It blew my mind too.

For a while, I had been reading on other blogs about how good sunflower butter was. So last night when I went to Trader Joe's, I thought it would be a good idea to try it out (hoping it would go better than my Cookie Butter experiment).

And I have to say, while sunflower butter is different from your normal peanut butter-varieties, it's actually pretty damn delicious. You totally get all the sunflower goodness in your mouth, without having to spit out all the shells.

Now that's something I can get behind.

As you can see in my breakfast picture, I also had some banana sliced on top, as well as a side of Greek yogurt mixed with berries.

I watched last night's Jimmy Fallon before I went to the gym. Seriously, I wish NBC played Late Night before the Tonight Show, because I don't know if you know, but Jay Leno blows. Fact.

I kind of had a late start at the gym because of some "intestinal" issues, but I still managed to get two miles in. The first one went kind of slow, but the second one when by much quicker. I love it when that happens.

Oh...so you know would I laid out a new workout schedule yesterday? Well... I've decided that I want to change it again. While I was running today, I decided that I want to start training for a 10k starting right at the new year. I have an app on my phone that gives me a training regimen so I can be in tip-top shape.

It said that if I start the third of January and trained for 16 weeks (which is the optimum time to train for a race), then I should be doing a 10k by the end of April. And guess what!? The Bellevue 10k is at the end of April! Perfect timing.

So that's what I'm going to be doing...starting after New Year's.

On another note, my Runner's World Holiday Running Streak is coming to an end soon. I can't believe I have run for 26 days straight. Only ten more days to go! Not that I'm complaining or anything.

After I got showered and put on my muppet vest, I was off to work.

Not a whole lot happening today, aside from all that scheduling nonsense. I had another salad for lunch, this time with turkey AND pineapple. Rebel!


When my EP got into work a little before 3pm, he still thought that our next show wasn't until 7pm. Surprise! They pushed it up an hour. If you were at work yesterday, you would have known that. Tisk, tisk.

So he had a minor (and by that I mean major) freak-out about not having the show done on time. But low and behold, with our powers combined, the show was done in plenty of time. Stick to decaf, Chuck.

While I was writing for the now 6pm show, I munched on some popcorn. It made me full.


During the 6pm, we had a mini-prompter malfunction. I'm sure my EP loved that. Thankfully our more-computer-savvy-than-me editor fixed it. Crisis overted!

After the 6pm show, I nommed on some butter lettuce topped with Trader Joe's Arugala and Parmesan stuffed ravioli and marinara sauce.


I warmed it up in the microwave, which made the lettuce a little weird. But I'd rather have weird lettuce than cold ravioli.

By the way, the ravioli was delicious. I'm so glad I have two servings left. Hello tomorrow's dinner!

Now I'm done with work, meaning it's time to go home and do...something. I probably should start wrapping Christmas gifts, but gift wrapping frustrates me because I'm really bad at it. I can never get the folds to be straight!

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I also have to add that for Christmas, I got my parents one of those fancy Keurig coffee makers that make a gourmet cup of coffee in, like, a minute. The plan was to have it delivered to the house before Christmas, and then I could wrap it and my parents would be so happy.

Well...turned out it was delivered to the house, while my parents were home. That would have been no problem...except for the box saying "Keurig" all over it. Surprise!

Instead of waiting until Christmas to open the box, my parents opened it and are now using their new Keurig...that I got them. No big deal.


I've used it once myself. Made some of their hot chocolate. It was orgasmic!

Just had to share.

Holiday Program Schedule

Today we started our reduced Holiday Program Schedule at work, which means not as many news shows since this is the time of year when a lot of people take vacay.

Reduced Holiday Program Schedule also means that I have less to do at work, since we're not starting 15/45s until the new year. Damn! And I was just starting to get in the groove. Oh well... there will be plenty of time for 15/45s.

My day did get off to an awesome start though. I woke up and made myself a blueberry waffle with almond butter and banana, as well as milk and a side of more fruit. Just like yesterday! I'm so boring!


I took my breakfast up to my room so I could watch the Homeland finale on my computer. If you've never seen Homeland on Showtime, do it! It's ridiculously good and Damien Lewis has to be the best-looking ginger on television. Sorry Conan.

The finale was bomb dot com, as usual. Afterwards I started watching some of the Dexter finale before heading off to the gym.

I ran another 5 kilometers before it was time to head back home and get ready for work. I got another less severe side stitch while I was running, but I managed to power through it and finished the 5 kilos strong. I'm glad that I kept going and didn't just give up when my side started to cramp, but it would be really nice to run just once without always getting a side stitch.

It's all I ask for, Santa.

Before going home, I made a quick stop by the bank to deposit my paycheck (one of these days I'll actually start doing direct deposit) because someone has to pay her credit card bill today. Hot damn!

After I showered, I watched the rest of the Dexter finale while I did my make-up and dried my hair. I mean, O-M-GEE! (Spoiler alert) Deb totally walked in on Dexter while he was killing someone (and no that wasn't a euphemism for something sexual, you dirty bastards!).

I have no idea what's instore for TV's favorite serial (cereal) killer now that his sister discovered his evil secret. Will she still love him in a non-brother-sister way (he's adopted so it's okay)? We she tell the cops? Will they go off and murder people together, Manson-style? The family that kills together stays together, right?

Anywho, now I have to wait until like next October to get more Dexter and Homeland. Damn you cable subscription channels and your long hiatuses (hiati?)!

I got to work and wrote my stories for the 2pm show.

I ate a salad for lunch. I feel like it's been ages since I've had a salad. There was butter lettuce, turkey breast slices and mango. Not very exciting, but still delicious.


Then I had a lot of down time waiting for the 6pm show to get stacked. So in the meantime I read an interesting article about beginning runners can train for a half marathon.

Hey, I'm a beginning runner! I can train for a half marathon! Sounds like a plan to me. I'll keep you posted if I decided to run one. I'm strongly considering it.

To keep myself full and from diving into the tin of chocolate chip brownies someone brought in (what is with my co-workers and all their sweets?), I had a 100-calorie bag of popcorn. Thankfully I didn't burn it when I put it in the microwave. Nothing makes you less popular than when you make the workplace stink of burnt popcorn.


I also brought a bottle of Sobe Life Water, cherimoya punch flavor. You might be thinking, what's a cherimoya. Well, friend, I will tell you.


Cherimoya is a fruit native to the Andes region of South America, much like my Peruvian ancestors. It's green on the outside, but white on the inside, and it peppered with little black seeds that make it a bitch and a half to eat. Oh...but the taste of the fruit alone makes all the spitting out of the seeds worth it.

It's flavor is unique, but most describe it as a blend of banana, pineapple, papaya, peach, and grapefruit. Whatever it tastes like, it's delicious. And when I was in Peru, we ate it a lot. They even had Crystal Light cherimoya flavors. Those peruvians.

Anyway, the Sobe Life Water flavor is oh so good and I suggest everyone try it.

Today was also the day that I was going to turn in my vacation request so I can get 10 days off in September to go to Barcelona and London. Holy smokes, this trip is becoming more real everyday!

But sadly, the EP that I'm supposed to give it to is out of the office today, even though he's totally scheduled to work from 1:30-9:30pm. WTF Charles! Just because you spent every day of the last three months working on your video game special doesn't mean you can just not come into work one day. Oh you're the boss? Well, okay then, take a day off.

But you better come back to work tomorrow cuz the sooner I know I can get these days off, the sooner we can book our tickets, the sooner I can finally chillax. So...yeah.

Also...my mom has started a Barcelona blog that takes our family from the prepping stages of our trip to our actual day-to-day adventures in the city of awesome architecture and even awesome-er soccer players. You can find it here.

After a while, my stomach was growling a bit, so I had some apple slices and peanut butter. Then it was more writing, writing, writing.

As I was writing for the 6pm show, I came across a story with the slug "My Little Bronies." I thought it had something to do with frat guys watching My Little Pony, but it turned out to be much sadder than that. And by "sad" I mean weird and pathetic.

It turns there's a group of nerds, I mean guys, who hang out and talk about everything related to My Little Pony. They call themselves "Bronies". And while they're talking about MLP, they're playing with their My Little Pony figurines. Like combing their tails and shit. I had to laugh just to keep from crying. Our assigment editor Jenn and I were IMing back and forth about it.

Then I went on Facebook and found that there is a nationwide, if not worldwide, community of these Bronies and their female counterparts, the Bronettes. And the funny thing is that they all probably have significant others, while I remain single and alone.

Maybe I should become a Bronette and meet my Bronie soulmate. I can be the Rainbow Dash to his Fluttershy.

Here's the KING story that we ran in our show.

A little while after the show, I had some din.

Spaghetti Squash with (new and not moldy) marinara sauce, plus turkey meatballs and broccoli. Delicioso!

Of course I didn't get a picture because after I took it, my iPhone spontaneously rebooted. I need Siri!

Another day down, another day closer to Christmas.

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Yesterday, my newly promoted weekend nights producer Billie said that she would totally help train me to become a weekend producer just like her. I thought that was really nice, since that's something she herself doesn't have to do.

She said that if (or when) I get promoted to a producer job (whether it's weekends or not), she wanted me to be more prepared than she was going into it. This weekend was her first time producing a whole show, and while she was a little (a lot) bit nervous, she ending up doing a really good job.

I love how at NWCN everyone is so willing to help everyone else. I'm not sure I would have gotten that same treatment if I went to produce in a small market somewhere in the butt-crack of America. I love my job!

Barcelona and the Fighting Tebows!

Today was the first time since July that I've gotten a full 8 hours of sleep on a Saturday night. And it was glorious!

I got up at 9:30 to an empty house (because my parents went out to breakfast) and made myself a blueberry waffle with almond butter and banana. There was a glass of milk and some more fruit on the side


As I ate my wonderfully easy to make breakfast, I waited for some football to come on. I decided to check my twitter to see how Barcelona did in the Fifa Club World Cup final they played at 2am our time. I was pleasantly surprised to find that they creamed South American champions Santos 4-0 to take the title as the best club team in the world.

Well, I can't say that I was surprised since I figured Barca would win. I was just amused that they kicked Santos's ass so badly. I mean, that's supposed to be the best team in South America...where they're supposed to be good at soccer.

I waited for my parents to get home so that we could watch the game on our DVR before I went to the gym. Once they got home we dove right into it.

And it was glorious. It was the best I've seen Barca play all year, with their one-touch passes and nearly 80% possession. Such a beautiful thing. It made me even more excited to see them in person (which I WILL do sometime in September!).

Once the game (if you could really call it that since it was so one-sided) was over and we watched all the Barcelona players get their medals and shit, I was off to the gym. I didn't have a lot of time to run since the Barca game took up most of my morning, but I made the most of it. I did two pretty brisk miles. I thought the faster I ran, the sooner I'd be done and could get home and get going for work.

Oh yeah...work. I still had that on the schedule.

After showering and what not, I scrafed down some chicken-less BBQ chicken on a slice of fiber-rich bread with broccoli on the side.


I ate pretty shitty yesterday, so I thought I would go back to basics with my food. Veggies, fruit, grains, and chicken-less chicken. What's not to like.

I got to work in time to see the second half of the Broncos-Patriots game. Sadly they were losing, but I thought if anyone can pull a victory from the jaws of defeat, it would be the mighty Tim Tebow. I mean, the man is practically Jesus so how can he lose?

Go Fighting Tebows!

Also, if you didn't see this skit on Saturday Night Live last night about the Fighting Tebows, watch it! Twas hilarious!



Unfortunately for the Mighty Tebows, either the Patriots were too good or God just wasn't paying attention, because they got blown up. Not pretty. Maybe next time, Tebows.

After writing, writing, writing and prompting, prompting, prompting, I had dinner.

I was hoping to have some spaghetti squash with marinara and turkey meatballs, but it turned out he had no marinara (well...not that was good to eat anyway). So instead I mixed in some chicken-less BBQ chicken and turkey meatballs.


It didn't actually taste that bad, but marinara would have definitely been preferred.

We had some breaking news tonight: Supreme Leader of North Korea and star of Team America: World Police Kim Jong Il died.

So sad.

Not really.

But we had to fix the first part of our show so we could have the story in there.

Now...I'm so...ronrey.

One a last note...

Now that my schedule is all flippy-floppy around, I need to figure out a new workout regimen.

I looked at my gym's class schedule and came up with this:

Sunday: Run and Hot Yoga

Monday: Run and kettle bell

Tuesday: Power Chizel (I have no idea what this is but it sounds interesting)

Wednesday: Run and kettle bell

Thursday: Spin

Friday: Hot Yoga

Saturday: Body Pump

This schedule is subject to change once I stop taking hot yoga. Then I'll probably start training for the Seattle 10k I want to run in August. Eight months of training may seem like a lot for a 10k, but I want to perform well.

Plus there's no saying I can't do other races in the meantime.

Should be great! Can't wait to start getting back into a regular routine.

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Okay...super lastly, I got to meet KING sports guy Chris Egan. He pretty much keeps the sports department running with all of the packages and interviews he does. I'm a fan. And now we've met.

And he was super-duper nice.

The Day After

The wake-up call woke me up at 8:30 this morning, and I felt surprisingly chipper considering I had only gone to bed at 1:30. Maybe it's because I was so happy that I didn't have to be at work at 4 in the morning. I don't think I would have survived if that were the case.

After getting up, I went down to the lobby to get Victoria and I some breakfast. I knew that finding a healthy meal down there would be a challenge, but I tried to make the best out of the situation.

There was a hot breakfast buffet that you had to eat in the restaurant, and a cold breakfast buffet that you could potentially sneak up to your room. I peeked at the hot stuff and it was the usual hotel fare: biscuits, waffles, eggs, sausage, bacon, blah, blah, blah. Nothing tickled my fancy, and I didn't want to get Victoria an unhealthy breakfast.

I picked up some instant oatmeal packets, apples, slices of whole wheat toast, peanut butter and honey for our oatmeal. It was pretty healthy if I don't say so myself.

I waited about an hour after eating to go to the fitness center to run my mandatory mile. It was whatever. But the gym at the hotel was even sadder than the Sad Little Gym at work. Either way, I got my mile in for the day.

After showering and getting myself all beautiful (because after all, I still had to go to work), we hit the road to downtown Seattle where we were going to have some lunch.

The drive up I-5 was pretty good until we got past Tukwila (and the 405 exit). That's when signs started saying it was going to take 30 minutes to get to Seattle. That numbers a bit high considering it should take about ten minutes to get from Tukwila to Seattle on a regular day. Sure enough, once we hit Boeing Field, it was wall to wall traffic.

According to my dad, that kind of traffic is normal on a Saturday, but I'm calling bullshit on that one. It took us about 45 minutes alone to get from Boeing Field to the Mercer Exit to get to my work building. And once we got to the exit, it was like another ten minutes to to get off the off-ramp. Ridiculous in a bad way.

At least I had some good tunes to keep me company.

Finally we made it to the parking lot, and Victoria got in my car so we could go to a crepe restaurant I've been wanting to try. We drove there and miraculously found a parking spot on the street close to the restaurant. Must have been good karma for all the shitty traffic we havd to sit through.

It was a tiny place called "Saley" on Olive Way, but it smelled deliciously crepe-y when we got inside. Both of us ordered the La Reine savory crepe, which can chicken, bacon (!), spinach, tomato, swiss cheese and their homemade crepe sauce.


Ohemgee the crepes were so good! I hadn't had one since I living in London and this was Victoria's first crepe ever. I was so happy that her first crepe experience was such a happy one. We scrafed those things down like it was our job. Definitely going to have to go back there and get a sweet crepe. Mmmm...nutella!

After dropping Victoria back at her car, I drove down Denny to the Whole Foods to get myself something for dinner. Why was I getting dinner at Whole Foods, you ask? Oh, probably because I left my sandwich leftovers from last night in the fridge at the hotel...in Tacoma. Massive food fail. Oh well, at least I knew I would get something healthy (and over-priced) at WF.

I arrived at work about a half an hour early, and the place was even more quiet than it is on the weekend mornings. So eerie. But hey, I'd rather have a quieter weekend night shift than a slightly louder shift at 4 in the morning!

While we were chilling, we heard a "ho, ho, ho" come into the newsroom. It was Allen Schauffler, who anchors at KING on the weekends, wearing a Santa hat. I had a mini-freak out because I watch the Schauff on the news all the time. Woohoo for Seattle celebrity sighting!

He went around the room calling himself "Santa Pez" and let each of us pick out a tiny knick-knack from his box of goodies. I picked out a holiday polar bear pez despenser because how cute is that!


One of editors told Santa Pez, "Whatever Santa wants to give me that's fine." That's when the Schauff had the best line of the day: "Santa doesn't have all f*cking day so pick something!" I almost died laughing. I didn't know that Allen Schauffler had such a potty mouth. Too hilarious.

I did some writing for the 6:30pm show. Actually it was a lot of writing. This was the producer's first weekend night show on her own, and she gave me a lot of stories.

After the 6:30 was done, I fiddle-farted around until I had my dinner: Whole Foods teriyaki chicken with brown rice, peppers, bok choy (I think) and some garlicky broccoli.

It was okay. Kind of bland and over-priced, just like everything in WF.

Then it was on to writing for the 10:30 update and prompting for the Sports Show. Fun times, good times!

On To My Weekend!

Well... I finished up my six-day work week, and the weekend could not have come soon enough.

I was totally dragging today. I'm not sure if it's because of the longer work days, or the fact that I need to pack more robust meals.

The day began earlier than normal, at 7:30. I wanted to get up early enough so I could eat breakfast and give myself plenty of time to digest my food before I hit the gym.

Breakfast

Last night I made myself some oatmeal so all I had to do this morning was heat it in the microwave. The oatmealzzzz has got: quick cook steel cut oats (which are amazing btdubs), pumpkin, pumpkin pie spice, peanut butter, and protein powder.

I think it needed some more pumpkin pie spice, because it didn't quite taste like pumpkin pie the way I wanted it to.

After about an hour of watching DVR'd What Not to Wear, I headed to the gym. I ran two miles and did some kettle bell work. I was lucky to get the two miles in because I was getting a wicked stomach cramp.

I guess not every workout can be like the 5 kilometer run I had yesterday morning.

Then it was time to go home and get beautified for work. After communting, I was at work...early as usual.

I dug right in to my stories for the 2pm show. Our other producer/writer Billie was in to do the 15/45s, so I had a much more laid back day.

Lunch

For lunch I had an open-faced tuna melt on my new Trader Joe's high fiber bread. It was good, but wasn't very filling.


I was pretty disappointed that I wanted to eat again like an hour later. Lame. Although I guess it's better that I ate at a more normal lunch time, as opposed to yesterday when I didn't get around to eating lunch until about 3pm.

What can I say? I was busy.

Since the 7pm show was nowhere near ready to be stacked, I helped Bille write the 15/45s. With our powers combined, we were able to get through them pretty quickly.

Snack 1

Since I was so hungry and didn't want to eat my packed snack so early, I went down to the cafeteria (which is open later now thank Jesus!) and got a Chobani and Sobi Life Water.


It totally hit the spot for a while. But while I was in the cafe, I spotted an old favorite of mine...the pink cookie. You know, the giant sugar cookie smothered in delicious pink frosting. I used to harange my parents into getting me one every time we went to Molbacks. So yummy...so fatty.

I wa so tempted to buy it and eat it in 2.5 seconds, but I knew I would a) feel guilty about it, and b) it had probably been out there for days and was hard and stale.

So I left it. Perhaps another time, old friend.

I talked with a woman in payroll because I had some inquiries about my Paid Time Off (PTO). My family and I are planning a trip to Barcelona sometime in the (I hope) near future, and I needed to find out if I would have enough PTO in the bank to take off for two weeks.

Luckily, I had already gotten approval from my boss to take off two weeks in September, so now I just needed to hear figures from the payroll lady.

She told me that now that I am a full-time employee, the best estimate of time off I would be able to get from January to September would be about 12-13 days! Hallelujah! That's totally enough to take two weeks off (if I don't get struck down by an illness and have to take days off). Combine that with my 26 hours from this year so day, and I'd have about 16 days of PTO (or a little more than 3 weeks). Woot!

Now we're one step closer to finally getting some plane tickets to Barca. My dream trip is about to come to fruition!

After that awesome news, I did more writing, writing, writing. Blah, blah, blah.

Snack 2

When I got hungry again, I ate my grapes and cheese stick. It's the meal of champions, my friend.


More news writing ensued until we aired the 7pm show.

Dinner

That's when I ate my dinner of Trader Joe's organic white cheddar shells and cheese mixed with carrots, broccoli and cauliflower. Mmmmm... mac and cheese.

I added the veggies to give the meal more bulk, since the shells by themselves would have been really sad.

Now I don't have to be into work until 3pm on Saturday. It's like I'm getting a two and a half day weekend. Yay full-time!

My First Full-time Shift!

Today was my first 8-hour shift in my new full-time schedule... and it was a little more exhausting than I was used to.

Obviously because I was working 4 hours longer, but also because some Occupy protests in Seattle were going to hell in a hand basket.

I got in a little before noon and got to writing my stories for the 2pm show. After that, I was busy trying to put together 15/45 segments.

Here's what I had for lunch:

A salad with turkey breast, pomegranate seeds, raspberries and blueberries.


I should have added a piece of fruit to that because the salad didn't fill me up at all.

Normally during the afternoon they run the segments every half an hour, but today they made it so I only had to do one every hour -- just to get my feet wet.

Doing the segment every hour was fine, but considering a ton of shit was going down at the Port of Seattle with all the occupy protesters, I probably could have handled segments every half hour.

After I did my last segment at 5:45pm, it was time to write for the 7pm show.

While I wrote I had some left over chili and a slice of high-fiber bread and tons of peanut butter.

This kept me fuller for a little while longer.

The 7pm show is a bit different from the 2pm and weekend shows that I've worked on. The music is different -- in a bad way -- and the show is arranged differently. There's more weather hits and chats at the desk.

I'm not sure how much I like it, but it will probably grow on me.

Now it's time to go home and cuddle up on the couch. Hooray for a full day!

I'm a Dumbass

So when I started running my 3-minute warm-up jog at the gym, it felt like I had old man legs. Stiff, creaky, and hurting. I figured it was going to be one of those run where I did the mandatory mile and then call it quits.

I stretched out my legs for a looooooong time, and it was good. Instead of just doing the treadmill quick start, I decided to be ambitious and selected the 5k workout. I figured if I was really hurting after the first mile, then I'd stop. If I could make it past the first mile, then I'd try to go for the whole 5k.

Thankfully my warm-up jog and massive amounts of stretching helped, and running became a lot easier. I ran the first mile just fine and pushed through. I increased my speed after every kilometer and managed to run the 5k almost a minute and a half faster than the last time I ran one. Win!

After the run I did a quick kettle bell workout and went home, hoping that I'd find some kind of spare key for my car. Of course, I checked out the key rings again and found my car's spare key. Fail.

But at least I found it and didn't have to call AAA to my house to unlock my car. That would have been slightly embarrassing.

I took a shower and made myself all beautiful because I had to take my Christmas card picture out in the front yard. These were the second round of pictures because the first ones we took made me look fat and 12-years-old.

These pictures went better, don't you think?


Dinner

I had some left over Pad Thai and a shit ton of broccoli. I didn't get a picture of it because I scarfed it down so fast.

While I ate I watched even more Grey's Anatomy on Netflix. I've already made it through season 6, the one that ended with the big shooting at the hospital and where Dr. McDreamy almost dies.

Watching Derek Shepherd lying on the floor bleeding reminded me of the time that I saw Patrick Dempsey at the Malibu Farmer's Market last year. No big deal or anything. We were at the same cupcake stand.

Well, to be more specific, I saw him walk by me. Then, like a creeper, I turned around and followed him to the cupcake stand and awkwardly stood next to him. He was nice, and had great hair.

He pretty much looked like this:

After he left, the girl at the cupcake stand and I had a minor freak out. Then I had to buy some cupcakes from them because I felt bad for loitering.

Such a great day.

Patrick Dempsey was the biggest celebrity sighting in my three years living in Malibu. He surpassed LeAnn Rimes, whom I saw at Starbucks and Albertson's.

I'm a big deal.

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While my parents and I were watching Saturday Night Live on the DVR, we were fast forwarding through the commercials when suddenly Coldplay's Chris Martin's beautiful blue eyes caught my attention.

I paused the commercial to see what this Coldplay thing was about. Turned out that it was an ad for an upcoming Coldplay concert at Key Arena. Holy shit awesome!


The presale starts tomorrow at 10am for American Express cardholders. Luckily for my parents and I, my dad is an American Express cardholder. Hallelujah! Dad comes through in the clutch.

So keep you fingers crossed that my dad and I can buy our Coldplay tickets for the three of us tomorrow. I have a feeling the concert is going to be epic.

Now for Good Wife.

Vamos Barca!

The Clasico between FC Barcelona and Real Madrid took place yesterday, and despite some pretty harrowing moments in the beginning of the game (a Real Madrid goal in the first 25 seconds anyone?), Barca pretty much kicked ass and won 3-1.

Yeah, the Madrid goal 25 seconds into the game was kind of a shock. And by "shock" I mean awfulness. But instead of freaking out and becoming beligerent like I normally do when I watch soccer games, I just sat back and believed that my team would pull through. And they did, so there. Although I was still pretty beligerent.

The best part of the Barca win: Ronaldo totally sucking balls like he normally does. He may score like five goals against all the other shitty teams in La Liga, but he can never seem to perform when it's time to face the Blaugrana. Sorry, douche-turd. Try again in April.

After the game I took a ridiculously long nap, which felt amazing. Apparently the game took more out of me than I realized. Then after eating some dinner, making my lunch, and watching some TV, I went back to bed at 9:30...the last time I'll ever have to do that.

When I woke up at 3:30 this morning, all I could think of was that after this morning, I will always sleep 8 hours a night. And that was a great feeling.

However, the great feeling went away after I went to get in my car and saw that I had locked my keys inside. FAIL. I guess that I'm so used to automatically locking my door when I leave my car that I must have been on auto-pilot and locked the doors after I parked it in the garage. That has to be the only explaination since there is no reason why I should lock my car when it's chilling in the garage.

Or I'm just an idiot, which is another likely situation.

I checked on our key holder inside the house, and of course couldn't find the extra set to my car. So I ended up having to take my dad's car to work. That probably worked out for the best becaues my car was running low on gas, and thanks to me being a moron, I didn't have to use any gas to get to work this morning.

Of course, now I'm worried that I won't have enough miles in my dad's car to get back home. Apparently electric cars don't do so well when it's effing freezing outside and the cooler temperatures drastically decreases the mileage of the car. Here's to hoping it warms up a bit by 11am.

Additionally, since I was trying to conserve as many miles as possible this morning, I couldn't even turn the heat on in the car (because that wastes electricity). Let's just say I froze my little woman testicles off this morning.

Breakfast

I made another batch of oatmeal, this time with protein powder, peanut butter and banana.


I could have used the cookie butter again, but I ate the rest of the jar last night. And now my stomach churns every time I think of cookie butter. Blech.

Snack

The oatmeal kept me pretty full, so it was just a little Jonagold apple for my snack.

Lunch

Since last week's pre-run lunch was such a success, I decided to give it another try. Greek yogurt with raspberries and blueberries and a Smores Luna Bar.


I guess it tasted like a smore, if a smore was a marshmallow and chocolate piece between two pieces of cardboard. But it was adequate.

I'm done with my last early weekend morning shift. Holler!!! Now it's off to the gym and here's hoping I can actually run well today.

Last Early Morning Weekend

This morning was the last time I'll have to get up at 2:30 in the morning for, hopefully, ever. It's the beginning of my last early weekend morning shift and, I gotta be honest, I'm really stoked about it.

Don't get me wrong, I'm going to miss the people I work with and the whole laid-back-ness of the shift, but I'm a night owl by nature. I'm not down with going to bed at 8:30pm on a Friday. That's just sad.

But no more old lady bedtimes for me...expect for tonight when I go to bed at 9:30. Halle-fricking-lujah!

After our 5am show that nearly didn't end on time (it's usually not a good thing when you end on the sports package), I went down to the SLG for some running. I think my legs are starting to feel this running streak (15 days and counting!). Before this streak, I don't think I've run 15 days period, let alone 15 days in a row.

I'm stiff and sore, and running a mile today was kind of tough, but I did it. Then after briskly walking for four minutes, I ran another, faster mile. Which is always nice. But I'm still afraid I might be getting shin splints. My shins get a little sore after I run, but I'm not sure if someone that runs as little as I do can even get shin splints.

Meh. Poor little me.

Breakfast

After exercising, I ate some oatmeal I made yesterday with protein powder, banana, and a tablespoon of cookie butter. Nom nom cookies!


It may look like crap, but it kept me fullz for a while.

Snack

An apple plus half of one of my mini pumpkin loaves and one of my lime cookies. There's an apple in there so it's totally healthy. Totally.


After writing for the 10am show, I watched some more Grey's. I'm in the end of season five when Katherine Heigl's character (the one that I hate) is dying of cancer. She annoys the crap out of me, even when she's dying. I can't wait for her to get all crazy and run away (spoiler alert!).

Now to go home and get ready for the biggest soccer game of the year -- El Clasico!!! FC Barcelona (my favorite soccer team in the history of ever) against their bitter rivals (and grade-A douchebags) Real Madrid.

I'm a little nervous going into this game since Barca isn't playing their normal Barca-style, and Real is three points ahead of them in La Liga. However, this is the same thing that happened last year. Barca was playing so-so, until they played Madrid and whooped their ass 5-0. After that, Barca pretty much ran away with the league and Champions League.

Here's hoping for a repeat!!!

Thursday Flrusday

That was the best blog post title I could think of. Sorry.

After my difficult yoga session yesterday, I woke up feeling refreshed and ready to take on the day. I felt so revved up that I wanted to make blueberry and banana pancakes.


As you can see, one turned out fine and the other was a little burnt. Par of the course at this point. I also had a banana with some peanut butter and a glass of milk. The more syrup the better.

After watching some What Not to Wear and Grey's Anatomy (oh yeah, I'm watching old Grey's episodes now), I went to the gym to get my run in. I waited a nice long while after drinking my milk before running. I learned from yesterday's funky-tummy fiasco.

My legs felt way looser this morning so I planned to at least run two miles. Once I hit mile two, I decided to stretch the run into a 5k. I ran pretty slow for the first 2.75 miles, but then really cranked up the speed so I could get to 3.1 miles before 32:30. And I made it with a couple seconds to spare.

It feels so lovely to run for a longer period of time without dying.

I got home and showered and did all that good stuff. I wasn't really sure what to have for lunch. But I threw together some mini pitas with tuna and a fruit salad. It kept me full for a long time, perhaps too long, since I was still a little bloated going into my yoga class.

After picking up my cousin and yoga buddy Maddie at school, we came back to my house and I made some mini pumpkin loaves while Maddie did her homework. They're so cute and mini.

Then we went to hot yoga. It was Maddie's last make-up yoga session, so she was a little bummed. Our instructor was the pregnant one that was pretty much a dead ringer for Deb Morgan on Dexter (aside from the whole pregnant thing).

I felt really hot during this session. Almost like I could feel the heat leaving body. It was the oddest sensation.

Another odd sensation was the guy in the front of the class that was essentially wearing nothing by boxer briefs. Boxer briefs that were so form fitting that I could pretty much make out all of his junk. There was nothing that impressed me, if you know what I mean.

After class and dropping Maddie at her house, I came home exhausted and uninspired for dinner. I heated up some veggie sausage patties, broccoli, and sandwich thins with peanut butter. I sprinkled the broccoli with a shit ton of garlic salt since my body was basically screaming for sodium.
The veggie sausage patties were...interesting. It was like they were the same consistency as the hash browns they sell at McDonald's, but they tasted like Jimmy Dean sausages. It was like my brain was expecting hash browns, but my taste buds were like, "No, it's sausage!" So strange.

My right shin is starting to get a little sore, so Imma be icing the ish out of it right now. My running streak is at two weeks and I can't stop now.

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I forgot to mention this on Monday, but when my mom and I were at Redmond Town Center, we parked right in front of this specialty running store named The Foot Zone.


I didn't really have any idea that there was a specialty running store so much closer to my house. I thought that I was going to have to go to Super Jock n' Jill in Green Lake if I ever needed running supplies. Woohoo for the Foot Zone!

"That's Hot!"

I went to me 10th out of 20 hot yoga session this morning. Lately I've been going in the afternoon so I could go with my cousin, but today I went to the 9:30am session so I could go with my friend Holly.

It was my second session in less than 18 hours...and holy shit were my legs feeling it.

Before yoga I hopped over to the gym to run. I was hoping to run a couple miles before leaving for Redmond, but my stomach was so wonky. Note to self: don't drink milk immediately before running, but if you are going to drink milk, at least wait an hour before running.

The dairy was not so kind to me.

But I got my mile in and extended my Runners World running streak to 13 days.

Then I drove over to yoga and got settled in. From the beginning of class my legs felt so heavy and tired that it made some of the poses pretty difficult. I think it would be safe to say that this was the most trying class at of all the ten I've been to.

But at least now I can bend over a touch my toes. That's never really happened to me before. Barreras a not flexible people.

After class, I went to Jamba Juice to get some liquid lunch. It had pomegranates in it, and pomegranates cure cancer...or something. From Jamba I headed to Trader Joe's because I forgot to get peanut butter the last time I was there. I got the peanut butter, and $60 worth of other things.

Some of that $60 was baking supplies. Since this weekend is my last early morning shift, I thought that I would bring in some baked goods for my co-workers. I wanted to make some sugar cookies from scratch, but a lazy spell came over in TJ's and I got the Sugar Cookie Mix. Pretty sure I'm going to be making some of them tonight.


Another wonder that I got at Trader Joe's was Speculoos Cookie Butter. It's like a peanut butter, but instead of tasting like peanuts, it tastes like a hint of gingerbread cookies with some biscuit. Some might think it's not that healthy, and maybe it's not, but as long as I eat it in moderation it should be okay. Right? Sure.


After scarfing down way too much cookie butter, it was time to make some cookies.

I mixed the Trader Joe's Sugar Cookie mix with the butter, egg and the zest of two limes until it turned into a big dough ball. Then I chilled it in the fridge for about 4 hours. The box said I could chill it up to 24 hours, but I really didn't want to wait that long.

In the four hours of chilling, I ate TJ's Goat Cheese and Sundried tomato ravioli, butter lettuce, and fruit. Meh.

Back to the cookies. I rolled out the dough and cut the cookies into circles. Since my dad threw out all our cookie cutters, I MacGuyvered that shit and cut the dough with a coffee cup. Perfect circles.

Then it was time to go in the oven. Rise, cookies, rise!!!

I whipped up a little frosting/glaze thing using some confectioners' sugar, butter, water and the juice of a lime. These are lime sugar cookies after all.

I am using all my power to not eat all the cookies before I bring them to work on Saturday. It might be tough because they look so damn delicious.

I did let my parents taste test them, and they said the cookies were delicious. So I think my coworkers will be very happy with me.