cindy’s world

As pleasantly surprised as I was at my cardio ability yesterday, I was inversely dismayed at how weak my abs are today. I wonder how I even sit up in the mornings. Nevertheless, I hit the weights, did 3 sets of each major muscle group in resistance training, 5 minutes of stairclimber, bunch of abs. That cute little inspiring DA smiled at me and settled into the ab bench next to me. MAN I felt fat next to her. Well, in time…

Meanwhile with two workouts under my belt, I’ll feel less guilty about seeing my friends. I met up with Anny last nite and had a tasty shrimp angelhair pasta in a light tomato cream sauce, and today I’m meeting up with Vicky at her new house (which I’ve never seen), then catching some drinks and maybe dinner with Dwaine after that. As I’m heading to Vicky’s directly after work, I made sure to bring a change of clothes that are looser-fitting for food and alcohol consumption.

(photo of the beautiful 5′2″ Alyssa Milano courtesty of www.sofeminine.co.uk)

I haven’t had a meaningful workout since before the wedding. Yup, you heard me right. Some days after the wedding in early September I stood in front of the mirror staring at my smaller boobs and the bones poking out disgustingly in between them, while grabbing and jiggling the omnipresent lower abdominal fat roll, and thought, “Geez, I can’t lose any more fat, I already look kinda gross and my curves are disappearing, and it’s apparent my body isn’t gonna burn up fat from where I WANT it to burn up.” So I decided that I’d rather put on a few more pounds and bring the curves back. Rather than being gross AND lumpy, I could just be lumpy. In the following 3 months the holiday chaos made working out at lunchtime pretty difficult; either I’ve had to work through lunch, or Gym Trainee (my ride) had to, or we both just didn’t feel like gymming and would take a brisk walk around the neighborhood instead. Our handful of gym days produced unmotivated and uninspired workouts. Knowing I wasn’t giving it my all in the calories spent area, I made an effort to control the calories taken in. The results aren’t bad; I probably gained 2-3 pounds since before Thanksgiving, maybe 8 overall since the wedding. My weight and fat percentage are acceptable, but I’d like to look more toned, so I knew I was gonna have to find my motivation somewhere.

New Year’s Day, Gym Trainee and her son woke up at our house from spending New Year’s Eve with us. More acurately, with me; Mr. W spent much of the evening playing a computer game while the remaining 3 of us hung out. He explained it was the only way he could stay awake. He eventually, after deflecting half a dozen death glares from me, left the computer and came to sit with us in the living room, and then called it quits and went to bed at 11p. So I rang in the new year with Gym Trainee and my godson with Martinelli sparkling cider. I’d actually missed the transition and countdown while I was in the kitchen struggling with the bottle opener. Oh well. I’ve had worse new years. So anyway, New Year’s Day we watched a marathon of The Biggest Loser, Season 3, and Gym Trainee and I got so inspired to work out. She has this week off on vacation, but promised to hit the gym and catch up on her cardio training on her own so that we can meaningfully weightlift next week when she returns. I’d invited Mr. W to go on a jog with me that day after our guests left, but he declined. You see, he was not as inspired because instead of watching The Biggest Loser with us after watching the 120th annual Pasadena Rose Parade, he was in the backyard digging big holes and planting rose trees. I look forward to all the colors that will pop up next spring.

Over the weekend Mr. W and I discovered a new show called “What Would You Do?” or something like that, in which 3 “out of shape” people in each episode are faced with a simulated disaster and they have to go through a sort of obstacle course to survive the disaster, or save a loved one. Like, there’s been a major earthquake while you’re at a movie theatre and various things collapsed. They had to climb over some collapsed theatre chairs, pull 5 sandbags off a large wooden box blocking the pathway, then pull the box out of the way, get down and crawl underneath a low obstruction, then up some narrow fire stairs after pulling a beam out of their way. Or they’re driving along an unpopulated road when they blow a tire and skid into a pile of stuff on the side of the road. The driver has to run around to the passenger side, pull a 250-lb barrel out of the way, grab the passenger (a dummy) who simulates a loved one knocked unconscious and carry/drag it 100 feet away in case the car blew up, then jog the 1 mile up the dirt road to a gas station where they could call for help. (I, too, was thinking, “Why don’t they have a cell phone?!”) Of course everyone fails the challenge the first time around, either because they couldn’t complete it or they took longer than the time allotted which is calculated by how long it would take an average “fit” person to complete the scenario. Then the 3 people are monitored by a doctor provided by the show, given nutritional training and fitness training by three Marine Corp drill sergeants (the hot young one was also a kinesiologist) for one month, and then they get to repeat the challenge. Most of them pass this time, or get really close.
Mr. W and I were like, “MAN. I wanna do those challenges and see how well we do!!! Why don’t they have stuff like this for non-obese people?!”

Today, the postage stamp sized iPod Shuffle that Mr. W gave me our first Xmas together is finally charged after years of neglect, and I was inspired to push myself. Just a little, though, don’t want to burn out. I figured I’d see if I can run a mile on the treadmill and then do some light weights. Ideally I’d do more cardio than that, especially when I haven’t conditioned my cardiovascular system for so long, but I didn’t want to get discouraged right off the bat. I started a light and easy jog pace. To my surprise, a mile flew by and I was so spirited I felt like I could run forever. Each new song I hadn’t heard in so long pumped new adrenaline and excitement into my veins so that as my hands tingled with it, I wanted to sprint right off the treadmill and through the walls. Everything was motivating; the large women on the elliptical trainers in front of me struggling through their new year’s resolution, Kanye West talking in my ear telling me to “work it, make it, do it, makes us, harder, better, stronger, faster,” and that what “don’t kill me can only make me stronger,” and seeing in my mind that I was running toward my goal, the look I want in tangible forward-running steps so that if I just run those steps it will lead me to looking how I dream (forgetting for the moment that I’d need liposuction in certain areas to actually make that happen).
And then mile 2 hit and I was bored. I took a sip of water which threw off my breathing, and I had to struggle for concentration again. Step step inhale, step step exhale. Mr. W appeared in front of me another half mile later, pale and dewey. “I’m spent,” he complained. “How much more’ve you got?”
I glanced down at my digital stats. “I’m working toward a 5K,” I explained in a stronger voice than I thought I had the energy to produce. I saw his eyes flutter wider in surprise. “I didn’t mean to — I was just hoping to do a mile, but I felt good, so…”
“That’s good, I’m gonna go shower and if I’m done first I’ll wait for you,” he said eagerly, and limped off toward the men’s locker room.

Well, I finished that 5K (3.12 mile) run and walked another eighth of a mile for a cooldown, teetered off the treadmill, and wobbled my way into the locker room, where I ran into a really cute new district attorney a few years younger than me, a little shorter than me, who has the anomaly of sharing my last name. I thought I saw her on another treadmill farther down but wasn’t sure, and now that I see her in her tight jogging clothes I thought, “I have GOT to look like that.”

Look who’s back to his old self…!

Whose back is this? Is it…is it…

*gasp* it IS!@#$

On our day off Tuesday, the vet called and did a followup phone interview. I told him that Dodo was still rubbing his eye on stuff and actually scratched his right eyelid bloody. He said he had time if we want to bring Dodo in for Plan B: cortisone shot. I asked what the side effect would be and he said that cats tolerate this steroid very well; if there are any side effects whatsoever, it would be Dodo drinking more water and going pee more, and that’s it. So we brought him in. Dodo was NOT happy to be back in his cat carrier, and even madder to go for another hated car ride. He was SO loud complaining in the car that I recorded him yowling and sent it as a voice message to Jordan and Flat Coke & Flies. (If you have Verizon cell service, I can send it to you, too. Just ask or email me.) Jordan was like, “What did you do?!”
So anyway, a quick shot later, he came back in the carrier and we were instructed that this isn’t a magic shot so to not take the cone off cold turkey; we were to do it under supervision in small increments. If it does work, the vet said, we’d notice it between a few days to a week, and the effect should last from multiple weeks to 6 months or so. I hope so, because my court reporter told me today that these things tend to be damaging to kidneys. Today is day 3 and Mr. W noticed Dodo seems less interested in having his face scratched. So we tried taking the cone off for the first time since the shot. He did clean himself quite a bit, but this time, even though I still feel the attention he gave his eyes were more brutal than a normal cat, he didn’t scratch himself bloody! YAY! We may have found a temporary solution. I’m so happy he looks like a normal cat now. Mr. W can stop with the stupid martini jokes finally.
He is drinking a lot of water, tho. Hope his kidneys are gonna be okay.

Isn’t he bootyful?

Mr. W is VERY excited to have a normal cat, as you can see.

Yup, that’s what he’s doing next to me as I blog this.

Murphy’s Law -
I finally get to my lowest weight since, like, forever, and the month before the wedding, my period comes 4 days late. The month OF the wedding, my period comes 2 days late. This pushes the bloating to DURING the wedding. I try to make myself feel better saying I’m 118.5 lbs at the wedding, 22.5% body fat, that’s not that bad. And then 1 night AFTER the wedding (i.e., late last nite), menstrual symptoms subside and I pee like mad. This morning, I’m 116 lbs and 21% body fat. ARGH! I’m gonna look bigger in all the wedding photos. *sob* At least my skin didn’t break out. And the wedding went by so fast and so much in the dark maybe people didn’t notice.

(Written 8-19-08, 7:33p, but it took this long to get the photos. Photos were as of last week; there’s been improvements since.)

The first week of living with a boy was stressful; the house was a mess and the very tidy Mr. W was about to pull out his hair. He so badly wanted his house to look a certain way, and there just weren’t enough hours in a day, what with having to work and all. But we chipped away at the pile of boxes, and over the weekend he built another Gorilla Shelf in the garage for additional storage. The garage is neater now, altho we still have to find places for more stuff if we want both our cars in the garage at the same time. The house is fairly presentable now, tho.

Up until two days ago, Mr. W fixed breakfast, handed me a lunch as we went to work, made dinner. It was all his stuff and his food in the kitchen, so he knew his way around it earlier. Three days ago he uncovered a giant box of kitchen food we had yet to unpack, and so I went thru the box as he worked on the sprinkler system outside. The boy has like 12 cans of salmon, 9 cans of tuna of various brands, a case of canned peas, a bazillion packets of hot cocoa (which he doesn’t drink), three commercial-sized boxes of Lipton iced tea bags, three bear-shaped bottles of honey, two difference sizes of unopened Heinz ketchup, 28 cans of different brands, cuts and preparations of tomatoes, 5 canisters of different protein powder mixes, 3 bottles of different brands of apple cider vinegar, 2 or 3 more different bottles of different kinds of vinegar (balsamic, red wine, rice, etc.) plus a gallon jug of store-brand apple cider vinegar, 10 boxed packages of various flavors of instant Thai noodle dishes…I could go on (believe me, I can), but you get the idea. It was an inane amount of food, most of which he doesn’t eat. Like the bajillion little packets of dried up mac & cheese. Immediately I resolved to clean this out cuz we have a HUGE shelved pantry and things are piled on top of other things. When I ranted about this inventory, Mr. W said helplessly that 1) he shops at Costco and things come in multi-packs, and 2) when he lived alone he was too lazy to dig out what he had in his shelves and pantry so if he wanted to eat a particular thing, he’d just go buy more. At Costco. So last nite I made a modified Thai green curry with peas and ground turkey over brown jasmine rice, and tonite I made honey-barbecue glazed chicken breasts (in the oven so it’s healthy) with wasabi and Italian herbs as a base marinade, served over a bed of mashed potatoes to balance out the sweetness of the honey.

Not a dent in the pantry. I haven’t given up.

The house is getting close. There are still some boxes left in the garage, but my car is now in there, too. I think the new plan is to not unpack those boxes, since the house is pretty full as is. We’ll make do with what we have on hand, and when we have time in the future, we’ll sort through the remaining boxes and see what we want to get rid of, what we want to bring in the house to replace other stuff already in the house. A lot of people are gonna be staying with us the week before the wedding in rotation, so that’s the more important deadline in getting our house “ready”.

Today, we bought patio furniture. A lot of places are doing outdoor furniture clearance sales as the summer draws to an end, and we picked up a nice outdoor 6-seat dining set and a 4-seat firepit conversation set for about half off the original prices. Over a thousand dollars later, gigantic boxes join our leftover boxes sitting in our garage. Tomorrow will be outdoor furniture assembly, putting the wall stuff on the wall (paintings, framed photos, etc.), and floor cleanup.

I’d been wanting to take advantage of the two bathtubs to take a fizzy bath bomb bath for over a week, but we always get home so late after running home supply and repair errands, and I’m too exhausted to draw a bath. Tonight’s lining up to be no different. Because I now have to get up at 6a to carpool into work with Mr. W (who has earlier hours than me), I’m tired a whole lot earlier at night. I feel geriatric. I miss sleeping in till 8a.

Photos will be forthcoming once the place becomes fit to be photographed.

Man, moving was rough. I packed for 8 consecutive days and moved stuff from house to house for the last 4 of those days. I have learned that
* packing is probably the worst home life chore ever;
* you can’t fill a big box with fragile stuff, books, tons of small stuff, or heavy stuff;
* heavy stuff have to be split up into small boxes;
* you have to pack boxes according to weight and durability and not according to category, even tho it’s instinctive to put all “bathroom stuff” into one giant box;
* oil lamps always tip over;
* I have chosen my sister-friends well and they came through big time.

Last Friday after work (day 2 of packing), Gym Trainee picked up her son and came over after work and packed much of my kitchen for me, which is great cuz I have no idea how to pack oddly shaped glassware and pots and pans. Then over the weekend, Busykitty Vanessa came over to help pack the remaining kitchen stuff and some of the other rooms, but first she brought over a light dinner of multi-grain tortilla chips, salsa, a couple of apples, some containers of cut melon medleys, a container of cut pineapple, a pack of mixed nuts, 2 bottles of water, and last but not least, a drum of mint chocolate cookie ice cream. We got to chat and catch up before we got to work. I dumped three giant trashbagfuls of stuffed animals and two bags of clothes on her; the stuffed animals were for her niece Lizzy and the clothes were to send back to Costa Rica with her aunts to give to the poor (which they do regularly on their visits back). I got rid of as much stuff as possible because Mr. W had already pre-scolded me repeatedly about not bringing “clutter” and “useless shit” to the new house. Monday, Vicky came over and traded me a small pepperoni pizza for the remainder of the ice cream (since I couldn’t eat that much ice cream before I had to move on Tuesday), and helped me pack my many many books and random leftover things upstairs. After moving all the larger items and heavier stuff like furniture on Tuesday, there were still little things at the house I could move on my own but couldn’t get done. Hence started the many little trips back to the house after work to pack some more. Each trip back, I’d thought would be my last; each time I kept finding more stuff, I contemplated suicide more graphically. I packed and transported carfuls of stuff EVERY DAY this past week until the final trip on Friday, when Vanessa again came over for the third time. She’d come over to pick up more things I’m giving away to her and her relatives on Thursday night, stayed to help me pack, and on Friday, she emptied out her SUV and we left a ton of stuff at my front door for a Salvation Army pick-up I’d scheduled for Monday, left some odd furniture in the living room the future renters may want, and made the long drive to the new house. Turns out the new house is totally in Vanessa’s neck of the woods as she works around the corner and regularly visits the shopping area visible from our back yard for lunch.

Today was spent unpacking. At least half the boxes in the garage are gone now and their contents distributed around the house. There were lots of disagreements between me and the W about stuff, cuz like Vicky said, when you’re consolidating two households of stuff, the general perception is “My stuff is stuff, and your stuff is shit.” He basically wanted me to throw all my stuff away and have only his stuff, whereas I feel that his shit, especially his silverware and drinkware, are ugly. He kept calling my stuff “cheap” and I told him my Oneida service for 12 flatware is NICE (looks similar to this) and HIS multi-colored, cracked plastic giant drinking cups are tacky. But he insisted on keeping his plastic “glassware”, throwing away my plastic sink rinse/cutting board combo and keeping my nice service for 10 squared drinking glasses and matching rocks glasses unopened so that we can “get rid of them.” He’d simultaneously used the opposite excuse of plastic being unacceptable and cheap to get rid of others of my belongings, like my Sharper Image DVD Power Tower.

But living together with a man for the first time (who isn’t my temporary roommate) had its surprising and unexpected advantages, too. For example, by the time I started moving in, Mr. W had already called the electrical, gas and water companies and set up our accounts; made arrangements for cable TV/cable internet/phone service to be installed; and arranged for our moving crew and U-Haul truck. I’m sure that once we get over this adjustment period of trying to fit into each others’ day-to-day lives and tastes, and he stops saying insulting things like pointedly saying that I’m to be in the kitchen and cooking for him and then the next moment say that it’s “his” kitchen and that his way goes while my way is rejected, and that I “never” cook, we’ll be fine. Or he’ll just tick me off and I really will make his “never cook” proclamations a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Oh, almost forgot. The Dodo. His first night was pretty bad; he was needy and up all night making noise, trying to dig a hole underneath the doorway into the closet. I finally couldn’t take the noise anymore as it was keeping me up so I kicked him out of our bedroom and closed the bedroom door. The exact same noise, the scratching and digging and yowling and pushing, simply transferred to this new door. He hid in the only closet I’d allow him in, an empty one in our master bathroom, for the entirety of the next day, leaving only to go to his litter box downstairs a couple of times. But now he’s fine; his tail’s up and he’s cheerily exploring the house and hanging out with us downstairs in the living room, sprawling on his side on the cool tile floors.

This house is coming together pretty nicely, altho I think Mr. W’s fear is coming true that it’s going to look cluttered due to the quantity of stuff we have and the small space we have to put it in. He’s now stopped opening boxes and is letting a bunch of them stand in the garage, saying that if the house is full now, he must not need anything in those remaining boxes, threatening to discard them without looking to see what they contain. I had to throw out some very difficult and personal things (I’m a total sentimentalist), and I don’t want to go through that again. It was fun having Vicky packing up old mementos with me because we go so far back that we have a lot of the same memories. I can’t imagine having all of those old tokens gone forever.

I had an action-packed day!

I had planned to meet up with some coworkers in their jury room at 10:30 a.m. to decorate their jury room for a surprise wedding shower for another coworker. It was tricky and ingenious how we’d planned it; the guest of honor actually works in the courtroom whose jury room we were decorating, so it was nearly impossible to sneak the planning by her and yet somehow get her to go to the jury room at the right time, so we told her everyone was planning a surprise wedding shower for ME. And we told her to keep it hush-hush, and that she was to show up at 12:15p after leaving early at 10:30p to get her wedding license. Meanwhile, while she was at the County Registrar-Recorder’s Office in line to get her wedding license, a bunch of us collected in her jury room and decorated like mad, laid out the food, cake, presents, etc. to transform the dull space into a festive Hawaiian wedding (their wedding theme) party central. I’d bought all the decorations Tuesday after work and had white crepe wedding bells, metallic palm trees, a coconut monkey, silver Congrats banner, coconut shell bowls, butter mints individually wrapped in hibiscus print wrappers, wedding bell confetti, even an inflatable monkey and palm tree. The court reporter brought leis, food and cake, the clerk arranging this brought more food and went with the wedding couple to get the license so that she could keep an eye on their timing and sneakily be our double agent contact. They were shocked to say the least. The party was a raging success. There are photos forthcoming taken by other coworkers.

And here’s where it got complicated for me. Although I was supposed to be down there at 10:30a to decorate which from all signs seemed perfectly reasonable since we hadn’t been busy all week, right at 10:45a, as I was about to go down, a 16-count criminal molestation trial walked in our door. I couldn’t believe it. Now I was stuck and was going to have to pick a jury. Luckily, the defense attorney needed a little more time to talk to her client in lock-up, so my judge, also to free me up, excused the case until after lunch.

And THEN, as I was making my second attempt to leave, I got a call from my real estate agent. Some background: the bank financing our new home loan had been playing games with us and giving us an extremely hard time. It basically felt like it was stalling and trying to find a reason to reject us. We understood we’d have to submit the loan application fully documented in this economy. That’s fine. We gave copies of our paystubs, copies of verification of funds. A couple of weeks go by and we’re in Escrow at this point, but now the bank says they need more documentation. Two months of paystubs, three months’ worth of bank account statements for every bank account we have, verification of the current values of our cars (even though both our cars are paid off), current account statements of all our retirement plans. We keep clean records, so we provided all this stuff, shaking our heads at how intrusive these requests are. Apparently the bank’s digging around for collateral, looking for a reason to say we’re not good enough. And then last week, the bank’s final request: give them signed rental lease agreements showing that people are lined up to rent our current properties for our asking price, AND a photocopy of these renters’ deposit checks, AND proof that these checks were deposited into our bank accounts. WTF! We let our management company take care of these requests and he faxed the appropriate materials. How violating of our privacy! It seemed like we were going to miss our Escrow closing deadline before our loans would fund. We were in a 35-day Escrow, the last day of which is August 1.

Well, when my realtor called this morning, he said all the documents were received, written up, pushed through in record time and that we HAVE to be at the Escrow office that afternoon to sign the closing documents in order for the loan to fund by tomorrow to meet our Escrow closing deadline. “But I JUST got a huge trial and I can’t leave!” I wailed. It never fails; I hadn’t had much to do all week and now THIS today of all times. I said I’d see what I can do and call him back. And rushed down to decorate for the wedding shower after 3 failed attempts to get a hold of each of my 3 supervisors on the phone.

While I was down there in panic mode, late for the decorating and busting my butt to get it all done before the return of the guests of honor, freaking about needing to leave that afternoon but not being able to find a supervisor for permission, a coworker stepped up and volunteered to handle my trial mid-afternoon after her own hearing so that I could leave early. And then later, another coworker agreed to take over my courtroom immediately after lunch before the first coworker is available, so that I could leave even earlier than that. I was so touched!! As soon as the party was over at the close of lunch, I rushed off, but not before learning that my trial is going away; the defendant had decided to take a plea bargain! What are the odds on THIS kind of trial?!

Mr. W and I met at his house, dropped off my car, and we went to his bank to withdraw a cashier’s check for his portion of the down payment, and then went to my bank to do the same for my portion. We got to the Escrow office near our new house at exactly the time requested by the Escrow officer, a mere minute before our real estate agent himself showed up. We did a new incredibly efficient thing of “e-signing” our Escrow documents, signed off on the house stuff, and then Escrow said it needed proof of home insurance as the last thing before we’re done. Wait. I didn’t take out home insurance on the new house yet. I’d brought my insurance bills with me to work today, intending to call to cancel insurance on my current property, but wasn’t able to before all insanity broke loose. I remembered that coincidentally, my insurance company had called for me earlier as I was in front of the teller and I’d told her I couldn’t talk at the moment but would call back. I called back in the Escrow office and turned out they’d received a request from Escrow to send proof of insurance, so my insurance company and I, over the phone, set up the required insurance as Mr. W finished off the e-signing. By the time Escrow signing was done, my insurance was faxing the Escrow office our quote and new policy (at an incredible price, too!) for us to sign, and everything required was fulfilled perfectly and simultaneously. Escrow should close on time tomorrow, our loan fully funded. Even our agent was amazed.

WHEW!

But we still had a final inspection of the house to do. So Mr. W, myself, and the realtor did that after leaving the Escrow office. Everything was fine. I’m taking tomorrow off to pack so we can move over the weekend or at least at the beginning of the week. INSANE!!! And none too soon; our management company called Mr. W as we were doing our home inspection and said happily, “You need to get out! The renters want in ASAP!” Woohoo!

Today is Mr. W’s birthday. Hippo birdie, Mr. Double-You! If I had double yous, I’d stand in the middle and make a sandwich. Or make both of you make me a sandwich. Yeah, that’s probably more likely.

He didn’t want to have a birthday celebration this year, so I just got him something he asked for, a book with accompanying CD-Rom of Photoshop CS3 tutorials and tricks for editing portraits. He’s going to do our wedding album all by himself! I know Flip Flop Girl is doing her and Wilco’s on her own, but I wouldn’t attempt it. This is right up Mr. W’s alley, though, the computer and digital photography addict that he is. While I was at the bookstore selecting his tutorial book, I came across a cookbook that’s also an informative introduction to traditional Indian cooking. Mr. W and I had talked about having theme-week cooking when we got married, and we’ve been on an Indian food kick this week, so this was perfect to add as the “surprise” element of his gift.

I don’t really know whether we’d ever go through with food theme-week, but it’s fun to think about. We’d go grocery shopping on the weekend at an ethnic grocery store, and all that week we’d cook that ethnicity’s food. We’d have Chinese food week, Indian food week, Italian, Japanese, and American. We were having Indian food after work today (his chosen birthday meal) and I suddenly thought, “What category of food does pizza fall into?” He said it could be American. So American week is gonna be pizza, hot dogs, hamburgers, fried chicken, soul food, Cajun shrimp. Eclectic. And then another brainstorm. “Ooh,” I said, “We can change our kitchen and eating area decor weekly to match the food theme. And then when people come over, they’ll know immediately what week it is and if they don’t like Mexican, they’ll know not to stay for dinner.”
Mr. W added, “And we can use that strategically, so when someone we don’t want to have dinner with comes over, we can change the decoration to something we know they won’t eat.”
So of course I thought of MOH Vicky and her resolute dislike of Indian food, since no one else I know has a food category they claim they absolutely would not eat. So I guess it’d be like, “Hey, Vicky’s coming! Quick, help me take down this Chinese stuff and put the Indian plates up! Where’s that golden statuette of Durga?” Haha. Guess our friends are gonna have to learn to like whatever we make if they’re just gonna drop by.

(written earlier this morning; borrowing a coworker’s internet access to post)

It’s 9:05a and I’m already having a wonderful day! I started the morning in a great mood because the meeting with the management company last nite went extremely well. This is a godsent company, which is not only professional with unprecedented response time in my couple days of dealing with them, but the CEO I spoke with was pleasant, had all the answers I needed and wanted to hear, was chock-full of experience, and was extremely flexible. The company also had tremendous resources. They can strip my bathroom wallpaper, retexture and paint, clean, replace blinds, etc. at a fraction of the time and expense for me to do it myself. They already have an interested renter in my place! So they’ll do all the applications, pull credit reports and background records on potentials. If an eviction is necessary, they’ll handle all that, too! I don’t even have to be there. They’ll pay the monthly bills and send me accounting at the end of the month. And they’re cheaper than any other management company I’ve heard of. Woohoo!

When I finally got my outfit put together for work, I had a strange “first” for me. I looked strangely “too” skinny in the mirror. I don’t get it; I looked chunky naked, I could see gross fat, but when I put my clothes on, they fit too loosely to look good. So I had to change the shirt a few times to go with the narrow short skort I put on (which I couldn’t get into comfortably for a LONG time). The shirt I ended up wearing was fitted across the shoulders and chest, but loose from the ribs down. Really, really odd. But it’ll have to do, so I left the house. I hummed along with my MP3s playing in my car in the drive to work, had a decent drive without hitting my usual 27 straight red lights, and as I walked from the parking lot to the building, I was aware that the skort was so roomy around the waist that it was actually riding up and getting even shorter at the leg. Good thing there’s shorts under the skirt part, but from outside it still looks like I’m wearing an extremely short skirt that’s growing shorter with each step. Oh well, I’m still a bit late, so I keep walking. As I walked through the metal detectors and collected my purse at the other side, a suited tall gentleman in front of me, who had turned to face me, said, “Hello.”
Thinking it was someone I knew, like a DA or private attorney, I replied pleasantly, “Hi!” Then I looked up to realize that this isn’t someone I knew, altho he looked familiar so I’m sure he’s a regularly returning attorney. Probably in his late 30s or early 40s, well-dressed.
“You are so pretty,” he said discreetly to me. Is this sexual harassment? I looked down and realized I am indeed wearing my employee badge, so he knew he was talking to court personnel.
“Thanks!” I smiled at him trying not to look as taken aback as I felt, pulling my purse strap over my shoulder and walking around the detector to get to the employee elevator.
“You’re welcome. You are so pretty.”
“Thank you, you’ve made my day,” I said nicely.
“Well, have a very nice day,” he waved and was off.
It must be because I only put on 2 layers of my BareMinerals foundation instead of my usual 3 as per Anny’s advice on the phone last night. Wow, she was right. Haha.

Going into the employee elevator, I was stuck with a floating court reporter who had sought me out in a stalkerish way earlier in the week. On Monday or Tuesday, I accidentally ran into him in the crowded elevator after lunch, and he followed me out on my floor then waited outside in the employee hallway for me in a very obvious way as I dodged out into my court reporter’s office to stall and wait for him to go away. But he didn’t. And I turned the corner on my way back to see him and pretended not to see him but he blatantly called me out so I had to stand there and make uncomfortable smalltalk for 20 minutes as nobody came to rescue me and he refused to take my body language hints of leaning into my door trying to get inside and not inviting him and not divulging personal information despite his prying and not looking him in the eyes. My supervisor even walked by a couple times and I’d taken the opportunity to tell the reporter, “Why does he always catch me when I’m not working?!” but the reporter didn’t take that hint to let me get back to work, either. When I finally ended the conversation after blaming my judge for a stack of imaginary work, I returned to my desk to email my supervisor that we need a secret code word when I’m stuck in a conversation I didn’t want to be in. My supervisor wrote back that henceforth the “secret word” shall be, “May I ask you a question about the death penalty case that we’re doing?” and he’ll rescue me. If you asked why I didn’t tell this reporter guy that I’m engaged, I DID. He went back and harped on that but did not leave me alone. And this morning, he gabbed with me for a bit, and then called me from his courtroom 15 minutes later to finish gabbing. And then he asked me if I had any single Asian friends. Like I would subject any one I cared about to this boredom! In the words of my gym trainee, he’s a total dork. But luckily I was able to be honest when I told him that each Asian female I know or am related to is in a relationship currently or married. He went thru his dating resume (stable job, nice guy, has a condo…) and asked me to keep him in mind as he’s currently looking for a girlfriend-slash-relationship. I agreed. Uh, any single Asian chicks out there wanna date a tall Korean court reporter, stable job, not dangerous personality, appears to be pretty educated, non-fobby, 34 years old? Leave a comment.