Tonight I attempted to pick one topic to blog on, but I’ve decided that my day was a compilation of various mini-triumphs. I’m just going to rattle them off, and you’ll have to read and be amused, or read and deem me ridiculous. Ready, set, go….

Happy first day of autumn, everybody! I started my workday with Starbucks’ pumpkin spice latte in-hand and that, my friends, is enough to make this girl grin. I tried the drink for the first time last week. After my purchase I looked up the beverage’s ingredients online, and the information unfortunately falls on the same web page as the drink’s nutrition facts. Big mistake.

My grande goodness contained roughly as many calories as some of the fried selections at McDon’tAskWhat’sInIt and Taco BelchAndTummyAche. As a single tear was starting to pool in the corner of my eye I realized, “Substitution may be key!” Sure enough, if you ask the barista to swap a couple ingredients the taste of fall can be achieved without adding up to a laugh-or-cry calorie count. The bonus is, you also sound like a cool-kid, Starbucks-regular when you say, “I’d like a grande, non-fat, no whip pumpkin spice latte please.”

Yum.

At work today had the privilege of fulfilling my duty as the office’s Ambassador of Minnesota by explaining the phenomenon of the dairy princess. It may be hard to believe, but not all places have agriculturally centered pageants where the winner receives the distinguished title of Princess Kay of the Milky Way — and — her bust sculpted from a giant block of locally manufactured butter.

If you’re from Minnesota, chances are you know what I’m talking about. If not, you better read up, because this is some good stuff: the creme de la creme, the high milk-fat content of high milk-fat content.

Moving on…

After work, I had terrific first meeting with my new trainer.

My. New. Trainer.

New. Trainer.

My. Trainer.

Okay, now that I’ve said it a few times, it must be true. On Monday I signed up for an individual fitness adviser at the gym who’s going to help me (or more likely kick my butt) once a week. I decided to do this because the service was free, it’s incentive to actually go to the gym, and my body sculpting class overlord, I mean instructor, said that it would be a good option for me.

When I met with Trainer Andrew today we chatted about my fitness goals, my exercise history and *gasp* nutrition. It turns out, in addition to being a certified athletic trainer he is also holds a certificate in nutrition. This doesn’t bode particularly well for me considering that ice cream is a major food category in my diet, but perhaps I’ll keep that little fact to myself. Please note: I save my morning calories so that I get to hang with my buds Ben and Jerry in the evening.

I can also tell that Trainer Andrew is going to be my real-life buddy. He grew up in Illinois a short distance from Lena’s hometown, has traveled most of Upstate New York with his rugby team, and his family enjoys shopping at the Mall of America. Game. Set. Match.

When I was driving home I recounted the consultation session and my fitness tests to David with just a tad too much enthusiasm.   

Me: He’s sooooooooooooo great!

David: I hate this guy already.

Hehe. Don’t worry; Mr. Lindahl doesn’t actually care, especially after I told him that Trainer Andrew has a (presumably fit) girlfriend.

For my final unique happening of the day, Lena made crab cakes at home tonight, which is a meal we’ve never had the courage to prepare in our own kitchen. The food turned out fantastic, and I will tell Trainer Andrew about the crab cakes but not our buttery mashed potato side dish unless he instigates an interrogation session.

• Tags
• daily life
• fitness
• work out
• food
• Starbucks

I was struck by an uncontrollable hunger pang while sitting at my desk this past Thursday afternoon. The ache was of no fault but my own because I foolishly attempted to eat a salad for lunch. Some people, namely skinny girls, swear that they can eat only a salad and achieve supreme digestive fulfillment. I have never reached such a state of nirvana after eating foliage. Instead, leafy greens make me long for more substance, and my body treats a salad like it’s a warm up: the light stretch before the carbo cardio. 

This is why, with two hours remaining in the workday, my stomach was groaning and gurgling when I unexpectedly burst out, “I wish work was like elementary school, and we had milk break once a day!”

Pause. Swivel. Stare.

Both of my officemates stopped what they were doing, turned to face me, and said in unison, “Milk break?”

“Yeah…?”

“What is that?”

I spent the next five minutes explaining the ritual of milk break to them, so now let’s all relive that enjoyable elementary routine together.

Every day two students were selected for milk break duty, and they would walk to the cafeteria carrying the designated milk break tray. The students would then load up the cargo carrier with little cartons of milk counting each one carefully until they had reached the attendance number their teacher trusted them to remember. Then they would add one orange juice for the shunned (ahem, special) lactose intolerant kid and march back to their classroom with milk in hand. Next the milk break designees would set one milk carton on each student’s desk and sit down at their own seats ready to munch on the snacks brought to school from home that morning. Every student would open up his or her milk carton using the peel-spread-and-push method and hope that he or she lucked out with a good carton rather than one with too much glue. Those buggers required students to start picking at the spout with their fingernail and inevitably drink milk that tasted like cardboard through a milk-saturated, spongy spout.

I would dare to say that ranking just behind recess, milk break was the second-best part of the school day for most kids. I was starting to feel bad that my coworkers missed out on this staple of student life in the Northeast and South where they grew up, respectively, when Travis interrupted me and said, “Oh! You mean snack time!”

Poking fun of the dire state of dietary traditions down South, Travis then admitted that if he did have a snack time like this as a child, it probably consisted of something nutritious like chocolate milk and cheese puffs. I was always a fan of milk and cookies during milk break, which isn’t much healthier than Travis’ treat, but at least it sounds like a more fitting match.

In a generic sense, my milk break was a snack time as Travis said, but I’ve been wondering since Thursday if milk break is a Midwestern term, a Minnesotan term, or a “Laura’s a weirdo” term.

What do you think?

Never mind, don’t answer that.

Travis also said that at times he and his peanut-sized Southern peers all received cartons of fruit punch rather than cartons of milk. Now that is just plain crazy talk.

• Tags
• childhood
• minnesota
• food
• elementary school

Alright, I admit it. I went on an enormous blog hiatus, but I’m ready to repent, reform and regurgitate some of my happenings. Truthfully, while I was blog-mute I still thought about items I could post or should post. I simply let my laziness, packed schedule, crisis-control status, trips out of state, and other interruptions divert my attention.

When I began this list a few days ago I planned to make a chronicle of 101 events that occurred in the upheaval of moves, visitors, and the cold season. Instead, I’m just going to keep going down the list and when I can’t think of anything else to say, that will be that. No need to ramble on and on to achieve a long list when my “short list” is still a daunting endeavor. Oh, and these items are not in chronological order. Sorry, but it’s just not happening. 

1. Austrian and boyfriend stormed Savannah and proceeded to taste test their way through the city. After all, eating is what Savannahians like to do best.

2. An outing to the dance club with the aforementioned fellas reminded me of my college days.

3. My first road trip from Georgia to the Sunshine State. St. Petersburg’s bays and bridges are amazing.

4. Blustery beach strolls.

5. Finishing the never-ending fence. I will have to find a new hobby because I can no longer look into the backyard to see the construction or, more commonly, static state of the fence.

6. Distinguishing theirs from ours. Once Cora and Harold decided to move to Boulder we had turn the house upside down. In its most basic sense, we had to separate out the big from the small. Notice the random assortment of crap in my room, and how necessities like a bed and floor space were in no way decipherable?

7. Finally finding an excuse to assemble the bedroom furniture I bought in October.

8. Valentine’s Day plotting and mailing.

9. Trim taping.

10. Priming.

11. Painting.

12. More Painting. Thank goodness for helpful friends.

13. Cleaning. Dust bunnies, dust rabbits, and dust gazelles galore.

14. Mattress testing and buying. I think this is a strange, but possibly addictive phenomenon.

15. Watching a B&D Burger Challenge. My spectatorship of two men attempting to individually eat a three-pound hamburger and a one-pound basket of fries in 40 minutes started out amusing and ended in sympathy.

16. Coffee breaks. Note, when you buy a new coffee maker you should also buy its companion filters, otherwise it is just a counter top decoration and you still need to call in reinforcements for a caffeine fix.

17. Vacuum purchases.

18. Vacuum returns and re-purchases. Plaster dust, cat hair, rocks, dirt and other miscellaneous debris were too much for the little guy. RIP.

19. Dusting off the old college dishes, pots and pans. They seemed so much more sophisticated a year ago…

20. Assembling Barbie’s dream closet…barring bubblegum pink clothing and plastic shoes.

21. Multiple Home Depot and Target runs daily.

22. Return to Minnesota for Grandpa’s funeral. A sad time made manageable by family and friends. Here’s a link to the legacy my grandfather left, in brief.

23. Snowpocalypse in Chicago grounding Cora, Harold and me in Minneapolis.

24. The crash of my laptop and resurrection of my laptop.

25. Plague #1 – Harold succumbs.

26. Plague #2 – Cora is down for the count.

27. Plague #3 – Lena wakes up with a 101-degree fever, good grief.

28. Initiating a two-a-day Airborne tablet routine. Keeping my fingers crossed and my thoughts positive that I won’t get sick.

29. All of Cora and Harold’s “stuff” moves to Boulder.

30. Absence of “stuff” means lounging in the living room on beach chairs and sleeping on air mattresses.

31. Lawn raking. One million pine needles down, one million to go.

32. Kitty panic attacks. Poor Gus was terrified by all of the moving commotion.

33. Sleeping – and not sleeping – on an air mattress with scared kitty at my side. This is NOT standard procedure.

34. Working.

35. Working a lot.

36. Valentine’s Day box from Mama Swanson arrives. Oooo’s and Aww’s always abound. The gift tags also make great name badges.

37. Eating at new restaurants. I highly recommend Bonefish Grill and Angel’s BBQ when you come to Savannah to visit.

38. Dead battery at the airport on return trip from Minnesota. Apparently the dome light does not like to be turned on for five days straight.

39. Accidentally crushing my office plant to near death with a window blind.

40. Office plant goes from a dozen leaves to three.

41. I am mocked in the office and plant has inferiority complex.

42. Cats keep me awake forever.

David: Did you get any sleep?

Me: Ehhh, for two or so hours at a time. The cats had me up at 2:30 and 6:30 and a time in between where I didn’t check the clock and then again at 7:30.

David: What do they do? How did Cora deal with them?

Me: They bang and paw on the bathroom door because they want out and it never used to be an issue before. It’s naughty George, of course.

David: So let them out so you can sleep

Me: No, then they run around and make noise still it’s a losing battle.

David: So send them to the adoption center.

43. Superbowl partying.

44. Finding three pairs of (SALE) shoes to buy in 30 minutes – I have an addiction. But what would Barbie’s dream closet be without lots of shoes?

45. Unpacking my trunk. Yes, miscellaneous items have been riding back and forth to work with me because we simply didn’t need more crap in the house.

46. Eating enormous quantities of Indian food. After three days, every Gladware container in our house was stained Chicken Tika Masala red.

47. Eating Chinese food for days and days. The fake stuff. Not the Lena stuff.

48. Assembling an IKEA desk using only two of four suggested tools and illustrated instructions. I even followed 35 of 37 steps. It’s still standing, so I presume the omitted pieces were optional.

49. Valentine’s Day flowers delivered to my desk from my David.

50. Cramming five giant suitcases, three people, two cats, one computer bag and a backpack into my Elantra. All dreams are possible.

51. Leaving the house at 5 a.m. in order to get Cora and Harold to the airport on time for a 7 a.m. departure. Surprisingly, hell didn’t even freeze over.

52. Lena and I eat a luxury dinner to celebrate our first night as independent home dwellers.

Lena: I bought you toy story mac n cheese

Me: AHHHHH! best. thing. ever.

Lena: hehe

Me: And we have REAL butter too!

Lena: and milk!

Me: oh no! Who will help me with my milk consumption now?

53. Testing out my ability to drink no more than half a gallon of milk between trips to the supermarket and/or my ability to drink a whole gallon without waste.

54. Cleaning out the kitty litter closet. Notice how Lena is smiling? That’s because if you don’t laugh, you cry.

55. Figuring out what all the odd house noises are…now that we can hear them.

56. Reclaiming the kitchen counters from the painting supplies.

57. Eating breakfast, lunch and dinner at our hope chest (also known as our coffee table). We aspire to have a kitchen table and chairs someday.

58. Beginning spring cleaning due to 80-degree temperatures.

59. Spending Saturdays on the couch watching chick flicks instead of man movies. Goodbye G.I. Jane, hello Dirty Dancing.

Well there you have it. Frenzied days and big transitions. Now I have to keep up with my blog daily and avoid making a “101 Things” list in the future.

• Tags
• moving
• Savannah
• transitions
• house
• home
• Minnesota
• trips
• food
• Hodge podge

…about technology

Mom: “How do you capitalize a letter?”

Me: “It’s a text message. You don’t have to capitalize anything.”

Mom: “Oh.”

…about Cuban food

Dad: “You can’t taste the beef in this.”

Mom: “That’s why I like it. It’s really flavorful.”

Dad: “They must have some bad beef in Cuba.”

…about the historic switch from PC to Mac

Mom: “I’m going to buy my new computer tomorrow.”

Me: “Don’t you think I should go with you?”

Mom: “I can do it!”

Me: “What’s RAM?”

Mom: “I used to know that…”

• Tags
• parents
• family
• food
• technology