silver lining

In the last year or so, I have managed to gain a somewhat substantial amount of weight. This is due in part to a variety of factors, including, but not limited to the following: my own negligence (going to the gym is not something I look forward to by any means), my slowing metabolism, genetics, a work schedule that does not lend itself well to meals prepared by myself and eaten at regular intervals, a penchant for mochas (I've learned to order them with skim milk recently, and honestly, I enjoy them more that way) and a nearby Qdoba and White Castle. I can't help it. I love food. In part, I blame both sides of my extended family. Holidays were just as much about gluttony as they were spending time with each other. Who am I kidding? I loved it, and I still do. Thanksgiving is not Thanksgiving without Grandma Agnes' mashed potatoes and my aunt Cindy's vegetable pizza (as an "appetizer"), and Christmas isn't the same without Grammie's homemade caramels, my aunt Dorothy's brandy slush, and a host of savory dishes. We Gaffaneys and Grundmans really know how to put it away. To this day, I associate feelings of being overly full with family gatherings. It's just... what we do.

Every day I plan to go to the gym. I have my bag of gym attire in my car should I feel a strong urge to swing by there before work, after work, or on the way home from any other plethora of engagement or errand. I have been planning to go since January. My bag is still untouched.

I lie. The bag has not gone untouched. I had arbitrarily thrown some nail polish and a book I had been reading into it, thinking that I'd read whilst on the elliptical machine to trick myself into thinking that time was passing more quickly than it actually was, and after about a week of being unable to locate said book, remembered that it was in the bag. I went out to my car to get it. If I had time to read, I had time to go to the gym...

The best laid schemes of mice and men go oft awry. (Thanks, John Steinbeck, you really hit the nail on the head with that statement.)

There is, however, a bright side to this.

My hair is the best it has ever looked. In my life. No, seriously. It is. The color could use some work (this is also due to my own negligence), but the cut is superb. My stylist, a young woman who I happen to have known since elementary school, has set up shop with her mom in my tiny hometown. K has managed to cut my hair in such a way that I am able to style it up, down, straight, curly, sophisticated, artsy, and everything in between. So, you see, there is a silver lining to every sad story.


Now, be a friend and click on the ad(s) on my blog, so I can continue to afford going to see K, and thereby continue having several great hair days per week. Unprecedented, to say the least.

desperate

At tj maxx with a friend yesterday, perusing the clearance racks and shelves, I found an interesting little wood cutout, meant to decorate a home. So intrigued by this, but unwilling to spend the $3 to forever have it as my own, I asked my accompanying friend to snap a photo with her phone. With a little simple editing in Picasa, I took the irony to a new level. Pictured below is the result (laugh at it- you know you want to- I am still laughing).

(once again, feel free to click on the ads below and between posts- it helps to sustain my livelihood)

avian flu

Today I received one of those subscription emails from a salon I used to frequent. I usually delete these without hesitation when I see them in my inbox, but something about the subject line caught my eye- "feather extensions."


"What are feather extensions?'" you ask, and I must admit did the same thing.


I had preconceived notion (envisioning voluminous hair extensions that feathered out, like the style made popular in the 1970s by Hollywood star Farrah Fawcett, may she RIP), but that was quickly proven to be wrong when I saw photos similar to these :

Sweet, right? I think so. I think I could easily rock this look, or something similar, even at the risk of looking like ke$ha, a currently trendy pop "singer."

Of course, like any good 20something who often doubts herself, I forwarded the email to a handful of friends/family members, asking them whether or not I could pull this look off.  The responses varied from "probably, but what about [your church] job?" to "hot! and dangerous!" Best of all, though, was my sister K's witty commentary, as seen below. Cleverness runs in the family.

Ew. Avian flu. Pruning. Other birds try to hump you. Suddenly bursting out in whistles that sound like common songbirds. I don't advise this. --KG, March 22, 2011

Whether or not I have changed my mind will remain to be seen, but K's response put an entirely different spin on the the "hottest new look in hairstyles." I prefer that a winged animal not attempt to copulate with or on me during my next walk outside. And, while the risk is very, very highly unlikely, I do not wish to die a premature death at the hands of a disease most commonly affecting poultry.

P.S.  Do me a favor again and click on an ad- any ad. Doing so helps to put food on my table and (expensive) gas in my car.

blemished

not the coat referenced, but a garment similar in style and color

It's no secret that I have an absurdly difficult time trying to maintain the cleanliness of white clothing. Somewhere in my innate being, there exists the inability to effectively repel any substance that can leave a mark (permanent or otherwise) on a textile. I have often stared in a combination of admiration, wonder and jealousy at women who are brave enough to go around sporting outerwear in a shade that is usually reserved for those months that lie between Memorial and Labor days. How perfect the lives of those women must be- I'll bet they also never smudge their nail polish before it is dry or unwittingly wear a distinctively-colored bra underneath a not-so-opaque shirt. Those women probably have boyfriends and husbands who have never seen them break a sweat or with their hair undone. I digress. I wished that I, too, could don a classically beautiful winter look. Alas, I have a hard enough time keeping a white t-shirt spotless... that I wear to bed.

How could I possibly be brazen enough to think that me, of all people, would succeed in wearing a jacket that I would be guaranteed to spill coffee on? No, 'twas not to be. My clumsiness is simply a way of life- an inevitable rhythm to my movements. For this reason, I have avoided purchasing a white coat to stave off the cold Minnesota winters for some time now. Until this year.

Armed with a coupon good for $70 off a purchase of $150 and a very decent tax return, I made my way to my most-visited ladies' apparel store, New York & Co. Always one to check the clearance racks before anything else, I happened upon a row of winter coats that were 70% off. Perhaps it was my begrudging acceptance that even in late February, Minnesota winters are far from over, or the snow that had started to fly that Sunday afternoon that caused me to look twice at this array of leftover winter gear. Whatever it was, I noticed that an ample amount of white coats remained. How could there be so many left? Nicely made coats at a very nice price. I wasted no time in whipping out my phone and opening the calculator app. At 70% off the sale price, the coat was priced at a very appealing $24. How could I pass by this opportunity?

I did it. I bought it. A white coat.

Over the next several days, I was very careful not to do anything that might soil this gem of a coat. I even contorted my body into some very strange positions in order to clean the snow off of my car so as not to brush up against it and pick up whatever the car wash had missed. I found myself hanging the coat up when I would enter a house rather than laying it on the arm of a chair or couch. At night, when I took it off at the end of the day, I would look it over for spots and dab them off with a wash cloth.

It's now been close to a month, and my relaxation in caring for the coat has caused a drastic downturn in appearance. There is a coffee (?) spot near the pocket on the right side- when did I spill that? There is black dirt on the back- where in heaven did that come from? Along seams, there are darkening spots where the fabric must rub on things.

What is a girl to do? My sacrificial white coat has been blemished. Just like no good deeds go unpunished, no white clothing (of mine) goes unstained.




Now, be a good friend and click on an ad anywhere in my blog. :)

crazy sick

I have been sick for the last day and a half or so. Not one to run to the walk-in clinic for every sniffle and sore throat (having a nurse for a mother tends to cause one to grow up with the attitude "whatever doesn't physically kill you doesn't merit a doctor visit"), I have not allowed myself to go see a medical expert, though I'm beginning to wonder if in this instance, the error has been mine. I think that the sickness has been making me crazy. Like, a real crazy person. The kind of crazy person we delicately refer to as having "special needs" or "requiring medication."

We've all been there- had sick thoughts. No, I'm not talking mentally disturbed sick, but the fever and fatigue-induced sick thoughts.

As I laid in bed this afternoon and opened my eyes after resting them for a few minutes, I gazed up at the ceiling and thought, "my, what a white ceiling that is" and "it is so blank." In the middle of the night, I woke up and decided that I needed something crunchy to help me fall back asleep. I went into the kitchen and retrieved a bag of Doritos and munched on a few. I ate eleven chips. Eleven was the number I'd decided to consume that would create just the right number of chews to get my teeth scraped well enough to fall back asleep. How nice. Like apples. Or those dog and cat treats that are designed to clean your pet's teeth. Castles. I am a medieval princess. Robin Hood?

Oh no- am I going "Tom Cruise Crazy" crazy?

Even as I type this, I can feel (sinus?) pressure increasing in both of my ears. I expect to experience partial hearing loss by morning. I wonder if the birds will care? Wait, what? Birds? I'm sick. Fever. Chills. Mom?