New Year's Resolutions

I'm generally pretty good at forgetting what my New Year's Resolutions were by, say, February. So maybe by putting them down someplace I check every so often, I might actually be reminded enough to keep them. :)

This year, I resolve to:
1. Maintain my current weight. In other words, stay healthy and exercise, which--ahem--the Christmas holidays have cruelly and evilly put me off of. I blame the holidays entirely. But as soon as I get over this friggin' cold and replace the shoes the dog ate, I'm back to the yoga studio and my daily walks.

2. Finish my dissertation. Or get very close to finishing. I want to have an end in sight by this time next year.

3. Get published. Something, anything. An article...or even a novel! Just gotta get my name out there.

4. Be more frugal. I must confess, I am a clothes whore. I have apparently no self-control when I find something I like, that fits, and I could theoretically have the money for. Which basically means, I'm not in any kind of debt, but I'm not so good at saving either. Thus I vow to avoid the shops as much as possible.

5. Wear underwear every day. Not that I don't already (tho Toby might complain about this one if presented with the option that I might not wear underwear every day). I was just looking back at the previous resolutions and they all seemed like a lot of work. So I thought I'd include one that was easy so come December 2009 I can look back and say "Hey, well at least I kept 1 resolution!"

Officially Four-Eyed

So after at least a year of squinting at the TV, asking Toby to read subtitles for me, and desperately trying to make out street signs, I finally acknowledged I might be in need of glasses. I used to just blame my inability to see the TV properly on our tiny ass old TV that was all the way across a longish living room. But then when we went out and bought a big ass new TV and I still couldn't see anything, I admitted my eyes officially sucked.
So I went in for an eye exam. I did two tests before I even met with the doctor, and before me even saying why I was coming in, the doctor was like "So...distance vision getting a bit blurry these days?"...."Yes..." I say sheepishly. He runs a few more tests and doesn't even bother with the news that I will need to wear glasses and goes straight to telling me he is figuring out what prescription I need. Le sigh.
And today I have brand new glasses! I'm sure the novelty will wear out soon enough, but I'm excited cuz all of a sudden I understand what "sharp detail" looks like. And I don't have to wear them all the time, only when I'm driving, in a lecture, or watching a movie. So 5 years into being an academic and I finally look like one.

Losin' that booty

It's taken me a little while to decide whether I would post this or not. It's a little private and somewhat embarrassing. But on the other hand, I'm proud of myself for achieving a goal and want to have a reminder for myself to help me stay motivated in the future. Something about making this public might help me be more accountable to myself.

I did it! I finally made it to my goal weight! Well, that is almost true. I had a goal weight of 115, but when x-smalls, 0 & 2 size clothing got to be too big (mostly cuz I'm so short), I decided I might need to re-evaluate my end goal. So I'm quite happy at my 119...a weight I haven't seen since I was about 16. It's nicely within a healthy BMI for my height and I think it should be sustainable, which is really the key thing. Since diabetes runs in my family I feel extra motivated as I don't want to be poking insulin needles into my belly every day.

It took me nearly 8 months to lose 22 pounds (having a wedding and honeymoon in the middle of that didn't help, I must say). I suppose I gotta put up the requisite "Before" and "After" photos.





















I thought a comparison from our engagement photos to our wedding photos would be apt. Ooo. Even now, looking at these two side-by-side, I'm rethinking my decision to post this. Ack! But I really want to be able to look at this a year from now and say that I've maintained my goal weight. Because ultimately, it's not about losing it so much as it is learning to be healthy and staying that way.

And I gotta say the hardest part about being healthy is being social! I have no problem eating right when I'm at home, cooking dinner for just me and Toby. It's when we go out to eat at restaurants with friends (especially when margaritas are involved....all self-control goes straight out the window and chips and salsa go straight into my belly!) or to our families' houses for dinner that it gets tough. And people don't always respect the fact that others are trying to lose weight. It's always "have another helping" or "you have to try the chocolate souffle" or they lay out the spread of tempting, fantastical delights without a single veggie in sight. I think because for a lot of people food = love. They want to please you, so they make their best dishes which are so yummy because they're filled with all the sinful things that taste so good. So it's hard to turn down lovingly made comfort food because it is actually personal. People put time and effort and love into the food as a proxy for giving love to you. Turning it down is tantamount to rejecting them as well.

I've resorted to such sneakery to deal with this too. When going to visit others, I offer to bring a plate acting like I'm trying to help them out, when ultimately it's because I'm trying to get in enough veggies for the day, and want to have a low-fat option at the dinner table so I can politely nibble on the butter and cheese loaded pasta without starving myself. And I invite others over for dinner, rather than going out to restaurants, so I can cook a scrumptious seafood feast that also just happens to be waist-hip-and-butt friendly. Rather than the cheesecake at Cheesecake Factory, we have raspberry creme brulee from Trader Joe's for dessert. My guests think I'm serving something rich and divine, meanwhile I'm still on plan. Honestly, I don't think Toby would have survived my change in diet if I couldn't make healthy food still taste good. Lucky for me herbs and spices don't add calories. :)

So I'm still on my journey. I've reached a milestone, but I'll really be measuring success by whether a month from now, a year from now, or 10 years from now I've still managed to maintain a healthier lifestyle.

Fire on the Horizon

Tuesday evening a fire started in the brush up by Lizards' Mouth, just a little northeast from Goleta. It started out small and firefighters got on it right away, but then by Wednesday evening it started to get quite large. It even cut out electricity for several hours in Goleta. Here's a picture Toby took of it, from his parents' house:

As you can see here, you can definitely see the flames from their house, which is off Patterson.

Everyone up from Glenn Annie and in the La Patera Canyon have been evacuated. People between Glenn Annie and Fairview are on evacuation warning.

I'm really hoping this gets contained soon, but that brush up there hasn't burned since a fire in the 1950s. According to the latest news reports, the fire is only 5% contained.

I'm worried for Toby's family's house for all the obvious reasons. But I'm also worried for our wedding reception as it is being held there. If they don't contain this soon, we'll have to come up with a contingency plan quickly. Don't get me wrong--I'm definitely concerned about the people whose homes are threatened and all--but I can't help feeling I'll be upset if this significantly changes my wedding plans and things don't turn out as nicely as I hoped. I'm not trying to be selfish or unreasonable. It's just that I've been dreaming about this for a year and half now, thinking meticulously about every little detail. And it's not stubbornness--it's just I feel like if things don't work out nicely it's like there will always be a little tinge of regret that I didn't get to see my dream totally come true. Normally I'm pretty roll-with-the-flow I think, and I don't get my panties all in a twist if things don't turn out the way I expect. But this is different. It's hard to explain.

And another part of me is thinking back to our "playa wedding" at Burning Man which got derailed by a major dust storm. Sure it makes for a good story now, but it's hard not to take it as a bad omen. I mean, seriously, we're going two for two here. Why does something vaguely apocalyptic always have to happen when Toby and I try to get married? Well at least we'll have a total of 3 ceremonies. Third time's a charm, right?

Construction Madness

Last summer after Toby and I moved into our cute new apartment, our landlord decided some "renovations" were necessary. He hired two guys to come by and paint the outside of our apartment. It was a nice swiss mocha (kind of off-white) with a green trim, and we thought it was cute. But they decided to paint the green trim white instead. We didn't like it too much since it kind of made it look more like a mental institution...but whatever, not that big a deal, right?

Wrong. I don't know who these painters were but they sure didn't know their ass from the end of a paint brush. It took them about 4 months to do (probably about 5 times as long as any normal person) and it was a mess! They went to paint the trim on the lattice of the windows, but they used a wide brush on a quarter-inch trim. What's more, they apparently haven't heard of painter's tape. So there were these big globs and swaths of paint on the windows themselves.


















Then they realized they couldn't leave paint on the windows, so they went back with a razor blade to try to fix it. Which of course took forever, and did nothing but leave huge scratch marks on the windows since you can see there's still paint on the glass.


They also left big swaths of paint on the walls around the window as you can see here (you can click on the photo to see it in more detail):


And did I mention this took them the better part of 4 months? It was so obnoxious because I do most of my work from home and I was studying for a major exam at the time, and I had to do it all with these nimrods peering in the windows.


So, okay we got over that episode without too much complaint. Until now...


The landlord has decided again he wants "renovations". This time he decided he wanted to take out the window in our bathroom shower and replace it with a new one. We said alright, whatever. Nothing was wrong with the old one, but whatever he wants to do, fine.

Well. So the same "painter" crew comes in and takes out the old bathroom window (banging on the outside with a hammer, thus creating cracks in the bathroom tile around the window), and puts the new window in. Except the new bathroom window is about 1/3 the size of the old bathroom window. So they have to fill in the missing wall and cover the empty spaces with tile. But of course they hadn't actually ordered the replacement tile until after they put in the new window, so we were left showering with a minor construction mess for two weeks until the new tile came in.

Meanwhile, we're both too busy to care overmuch, so we just deal with it and didn't think much of it...until we saw the new tile.

Okay, so the old shower tile is pink with a green trim (kind of reminds us of a watermelon--like Nicole and Allyson's old apartment senior year of college!). Not exactly the height of style, but kind of cute in it's own funky way. But does the landlord get more pink or green tile?

No, he gets navy blue.


















Talk about ghetto fabulous. I would say it's hideous, but I don't think it even makes enough sense to be hideous. I don't know what the landlord was thinking but whenever we move out, I would love to see prospective tenants' faces when they walk in the bathroom.

Zoom Zoom Zoom

So a few weeks ago some irresponsible a-hole backed into Toby's motorcycle in the middle of the night and just left it lying there in the street. No note, no attempt to right it back up. As a result, Toby found his bike the next morning completely totaled. Parts of the tank, side mirror and gauge and tail were busted from the impact, but what's worse is oil spilled out over a bunch of the internal engine bits. It's possible that if the person had just tried to put the bike back up there wouldn't be nearly so much internal damage. But because the oil had time to seep out, everything got all messed up inside.

Toby had to get it towed to a repair shop and was dealing with the insurance company for over a week, sitting on pins and needles trying to figure out what could be done. The shop came back with an estimate of over $2000 worth of damage, and Toby was praying the insurance would cover it. But alas, at that point the bike was declared totaled and even if he bought back the bike and fixed it all up, it would still have a salvage title on it, vastly reducing its resale value.

So the insurance company came back and said they'd pay pretty much the equivalent of what Toby paid for the bike initially. Although bummed he lost his "Suzi", he was able to use that money to go and buy a new little beastie. Check this one out:

Hee hee! Idn't it sexy? :) Sure is sexy watching T on that bike anyhow. And this one turns out to be a bit better than the old one. It's a little more comfortable for me to ride on and there's room in the back for luggage so we can take it up to go camping or for extended trips. We've been taking it on trips around town--sure is a good way to beat the heat these days! And Toby's happy with it, so all in all it looks like a happy end to a sad little story.

Hallelujah!

Thank the heavens! I've just got an email from my adviser saying I'm (finally) ready to defend. It's only been, what, 6 months of editing and re-editing...and re-editing my dissertation proposal and now I can finally go ABD (All But Dissertation).

I suppose I should be more nervous about the defense. It's basically two hours where you give a 20-minute presentation in front of a committee of three faculty members and spend the rest of the time answering grueling questions about whether or not a) your research proposal even makes sense and b) you know enough about what the hell you're doing that you can do the research. From what I hear from friends who've already done this, the faculty ask you all kinds of questions you'd never have thought of, sometimes even questioning the most basic things, like: "You know, I think your dependent variable is problematic." What?? You couldn't have told me this earlier?! But surprisingly, I'm not that nervous--at least not yet. But I take solace in the notion that they don't really let you defend unless they think you're actually ready for it. I'm starting to think they just bombard you with tough questions to see how well you deal under pressure. I guess as long as you don't collapse in a puddle of tears or start screaming at them, I think really it just becomes an opportunity to discuss how to make sure your project is solid. So pretty much everyone passes it--though your knees might be Jell-O by the time you're done. I still need to prepare responses to any wild question that might even possibly or impossibly come up, but hey, I'm on my way!

In other news...we just saw "Once" last night, which is a cute movie about two musicians who fall in love while making music together. It's a bit slow, but I loved the ending and the music is great. I've been listening to the soundtrack all afternoon. :)