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By kilax, September 22, 2009 5:55 pm

My mom and dad both sent me separate emails asking what was going on (after reading my last post). Nothing! Oops. So I did exactly what I try not to do by writing that – make someone think I am withholding info. I’m not. Especially from them! Ha! I call them and blabber blabber blabber away.*

Thank you for your awesome comments. That was one of those posts where I thought, “hmm, maybe I shouldn’t have written that.” But I’d had it on my mind for about a year, and wanted to let it out. It’s older info. But sometimes, when I am trying to fall asleep at night, all of these thoughts fill my head and I have to get them out. So, here it comes, another weird thought:

Do you ever quit reading a blog because you feel like it’s bad for you?

A while ago, I subscribed to A LOT of health (i.e. “weight loss”) blogs. Some of them just contained news tidbits, but a lot of them were personal blogs of people struggling with weight loss. I was very much in the same boat (Ha! You probably remember those posts.) so I enjoyed reading them because I related so much.

But after awhile, especially when I focused more on running, I felt like some of the blogs became toxic to me. Reading someone’s constant, daily struggles with weight made me feel really weird. It made me feel bad. It was almost like I was feeling their daily anguish and frustration and disappointment, and it just made me feel… hopeless. It was strange. I had to put all of those blogs in a special folder in my google reader, and for now, I just mark them as “read” everyday until I am ready to look at them again.

It’s like they wore me out. It was too much of the same old thing. Which is ironic, because I get on those kicks all the time – health, bowling, running, travel… I talk in patterns. I think we all do a bit.

So I was just wondering if anyone else has had this happen. I’ve definitely stopped reading other blogs because I didn’t enjoy their style (which of course, is personal preference, and subjective), but this… was something different.

*oh, thanks for listening about my dentist bill, dad. I got it straightened away. They are covering the entire expense now.

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By kilax, July 27, 2009 5:34 am

Last night’s meet-up with Nilsa, Tori, Kevin and Sizzle was a total blast! It was my first time meeting both Nilsa and Sizzle. Nilsa and her husband were gracious enough to host us in their beautiful Chicago home and feed us wonderful food! Nilsa is so fresh and down to earth. I can imagine having lots of long conversations with her. And sizzle is so animated! She is a wonderful story teller and so much fun! I always feel refreshed and excited after meeting up with bloggers. I wish I could do it more often!

Tori, Me, Sizzle, Nilsa and Kevin in the front.

Steven chatted with SoMi all night. Just kidding. He loves meeting other bloggers too!

We had college friends over two weekends ago that made me feel the same way – stimulated by discussion, excited, and energetic. The thing is, we hardly EVER see them. Coordinating a visit with them takes a lot – it’s kind of stressful. But we always have so much fun with them then say, “Why don’t we see each other more often?!”

It is because we are also so busy and wrapped up in our own lives. We don’t always make the time to do fun get-togethers like this. We let our crazy schedules get in the way. Well, I do anyway.

I don’t want to be like this. But I don’t want to have a super packed schedule either. The month of July has been really stressful for me because all of our weekends have been packed with activities. Balance. It’s always about balance…

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By kilax, July 22, 2009 9:57 pm

The site:

My website went down on Sunday because my domain did not get renewed. I am  not sure what the mix-up was, because I normally get a bill for it, and I don’t think I did this year. I contacted my web host right away, who fixed and it said it would take “24-72” hours to come back up. 72 hours later, when it STILL didn’t work, they said they just had to point the domain name to the root folder to fix the issue. Why didn’t they do that in the first place?!?!

Thank you to everyone who asked me about it. I really appreciated your concern and inquiries! It was nice to know my friends wondered where I was… but frustrating that I could not do anything about it!

Update: Thanks to Lindsay and Etta for pointing out the comments were not working. Ugh. This is giving me a headache and making me really frustrated. I had to go back in and turn on comments and pings on EVERY post.

The Missed Blogiversary:

Yesterday was my four year blogging anniversary, and I missed it. Poo poo. Oh well.

The movie:

I am hoping to write a review of Food Inc. soon. I can happily tell you that I did not find it horribly graphic, but that I was disturbed.

The wrist:

I saw the orthopedic specialist on Friday. He pressed his fingers into my wrist, asking “Does this hurt?” until he finally got a “YES!!!!” or two out of me.

He told me that because the pain is more general, it is likely torn ligaments that are trying to heal, and have scar tissue on them that need to be stretched back out. He gave me a new brace to wear (with velcro straps THANK HEAVENS) for another month. He told me to wear it during the day, taking it off a few times to move my wrist back and forth. If I don’t gain full mobility in my wrist in a month, I need to go back to the doctor so he can try to pinpoint the exact ligaments (muscles?) that are still giving me problems.

As you can see from the photo, I cannot move my right wrist back very far. The doctor measured it, and I could only get it to go back 38 degrees. My wrist doesn’t hurt as much anymore, but I am a bit creeped out by how limited the motion in it is. I keep saying to Steven, “Maybe I could never bend my right wrist back that far…”

That’s as far back as I can get the right wrist to go, even when I push on it with my other hand.

Oh, and since I am talking about it, I just want to add a little detail to the story of how this all happened. Some people mentioned that this incident reminded them of the motherly warning, “It’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt.” Well, I want to let you know that the FIRST thing my mom said to me when I got to the beach (because she went on the first boat trip over) was, “Kim! I am surprised you didn’t go straight to that slide to try it out! Are you going to?!?!”

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By kilax, April 17, 2009 5:36 am

When you bake or cook, do you follow a recipe?

According to this article, most people DO NOT follow a recipe. But I almost always DO. I’m not confident enough in the kitchen not to!

Steven, on the other hand, only uses recipes and cookbooks for inspiration. Sometimes when he wants to try something new, he’ll look at a bunch of recipes for ideas, then write his own. But sometimes, he just improvises! He’s a true chef.

Some administrative stuff: On Saturday, I put up a poll asking where recipes should be posted, and the majority voted for a new recipes category, so I am adding that today. In it, you will find Fruit Pizza, Swiss Apple Pie, Banana Donuts, Granola Bars (re-visit the comments section for an update on the recipe!), the Pad Siew teaser and Christina’s Rainbow Cake. Most of the recipes for these items are posted in the comments section or in a link in the post. In the future, I will post the recipes in an extended post.

I’ve also been bookmarking a few recipes to try in the future: Denise’s Pumpkin Spice Muffins, Chocolate Covered Katie’s 24-Carrot Cake Muffins, Nicole’s Cinnamon Bun Muffins and Cathy’s Gluten-Free Brownies. Yes, I like to bake sweets! And I love to share them with my coworkers or Steven’s, so we don’t eat them all.

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By kilax, April 8, 2009 6:37 am

I don’t understand me lately. I feel like my emotions and thoughts are out of my control or something. I don’t feel like they are bad, just that they move forward without me. Like my brain won’t shut off.

I’ve been writing, passionately. I have all of these post sitting in my queue, just waiting to be posted.

But I am going to take a “quiet day.”

I think I need to start reviewing before I hit “publish.” I am letting myself get overwhelmed and too caught up in things.

If I keep “going going going” like this, I am going to end up crashing and getting sick again.

Comments (24)

By kilax, March 25, 2009 5:24 am

For the first time in my life, I find myself without an appetite. Food seems to be of no interest to me. The only reason I am eating is to fuel my body.

Eating has been becoming more and more about “fueling my body” for some time now. But I was still looking forward to eating. Since Friday, coinciding with becoming sick, food seems to have become a big nuisance. A pain in the butt. A chore.

Yesterday, I took my entire regular food stash with me to work, plus some extra, hoping I would find my appetite. But all I ended up eating during the day, unwillingly, was instant oatmeal, two bites of a banana, soup and a roll, and a homemade granola bar.

Then I got home and ran 4 miles.

That felt wonderful.

NOT.

So. It’s time to force myself to eat. I know this may be a common phenomenon for people when they are sick, but it’s not for me. I love to eat. I always want to eat. I would get out of bed at 3:00 am if it was for a legitimate, scheduled meal.

I know my appetite will come back when I get better, but right now, I can’t taste anything. The thought of food makes me feel sick.

Blah blah blah. Wah wah wah. I’m sick. Boring post. Boo. Sorry. Something better tomorrow.

Off topic, but making me crazy: Has anyone else’s google reader been re-marking things “unread” after you’ve marked them “read”? Mine has been doing this for a few days and it’s making me crazy. Sometimes it sticks, and sometimes it flashes for awhile then goes away.

Comments (13)

By kilax, February 3, 2009 5:50 pm

I had a post scheduled for tonight and I took it down at the last minute. It’s the first time I’ve ever done that.

The post was poorly written, and in effect, I think some of the responses would have frustrated me.

All I do is work and run. So… just imagine there’s a post here tonight about either of those topics. Thanks.

Comments (18)

By kilax, January 23, 2009 4:53 pm

When you are reading someone else’s blog, do you read ALL of the comments that were left before you got to it? Or do you just skip to the end to leave your comment?

Guilty as charged. I have a hard enough time finding time to read blogs, that I sometimes do skip to the end of the comments if there are a TON of them. If there are only a few, I usually read them. But most of the blogs I read get a lot of comments, so if any comment left by me seems similar to what someone else said, that’s probably why.

It’s a bad habit. And I know I am missing out on a lot of the conversation, by skipping to the end, but I just… keep doing it. Unless it’s a really juicy post. Then I usually read them all. Ha!

Now, please tell me I am not the only one who does this!

Comments (19)

By kilax, December 10, 2008 9:01 pm

A little public announcement before the post: I feel guilty writing posts, when I have emails that need to be responded to, as well as over 400 unread items in my google reader. I feel guilty for responding to things slowly or late (like birthday announcements and other important news in posts). Please forgive me. Writing here is an outlet for me. It really alleviates stress, so it is the first thing I make time for. I really enjoy writing emails and reading blogs too. In fact, I am upset that my schedule has not allowed me to “catch up.” You all know how that is though. Anyway, my apologies. I hope to have time to catch up… some weekend? Okay, announcement over.

This year, both of our families have told us to “expect a smaller Christmas.” Or rather, they’ve apologetically told us they don’t have as much money to spend as in years past.

I’m guessing we’re not the only ones hearing this?

It makes me really sad that people feel like they have to apologize for giving less presents during the holidays. It makes me sad, because I know they are genuinely upset that they cannot give as much to us as they have before. And I know that no matter how much I tell them it doesn’t matter to me, it will still matter to them.

It’s hard not to let gift-giving become some sort of obsession during the holidays. You stress and stress over how much money to spend, what to buy, and then how they will react when they open it, whether or not they like it…

Our big thing is that we want to buy people things they actually WANT, rather than aimlessly searching for something, just to say “I got you a gift!” So, we started brainstorming ideas for people back in October. But, as my second cousin Denise wisely told me, “I stress about buying present every year because I never know what to buy for people. I guess we’ve all gotten to the point where we buy what we want and things that we don’t buy no one else can afford.” Ugh, exactly. For some people, it is impossible for Steven and I to come up with good gift ideas, unless they’re super expensive. People in our lives generally have what they want. Or sadly, we don’t know enough about our own family member’s interests to buy them something new they may enjoy.

So, we get caught up in this whole stress thing too.

I always have fun buying and giving gifts, but I do worry about finding that “perfect” gift.

Yeah, it doesn’t exist. And I have quit pretending it does. I am just going to enjoy the holidays.

I started thinking about all of this because my office is answering “Letters to Santa.” Children in impoverished neighborhoods write the letter to Santa at their schools and then the Sun-Times newspaper delivers the letters to organizations that buy and wrap the gifts these kids are asking for.

I didn’t participate (because I just started), but I think it really put things into perspective for a lot of people, answering a letter where a kid would ask for something so simple, like “a stuffed bear I can hug,” “anything Hot Wheels,” or “a Barbie.” One woman said it made her feel awful that a kid was asking for a $10 Barbie and she bought her own son a $200 PlayStation.

We all know we’ve become incredibly materialistic. We live our lives in pursuit of “stuff.” You want to earn more money at your job, so that you can get the “stuff” you want, and live in your preferred comfort zone.

And yes, we all think about this more around the holidays, maybe feeling a little guilty about it, maybe not.

I just want people to understand that “having less” at Christmas isn’t going to ruin the holiday for me. But there is really no way to alleviate someone else’s guilt.

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By kilax, November 20, 2008 10:40 pm

Every once in awhile, Steven and I go to Sweet Tomatoes, our favorite buffet. We like it because they have a huge salad bar right when you walk in – that is the focus of the place. You make your salad and pay, then there is a little baked goods counter, soup counter, pasta counter, and sweets counter.

I have such a hard time going there.

Even though I make my healthy salad, and steer clear of the baked goods and grab a little dish of pasta… I just gobble it down. I get into some weird “buffet-dining” mentality that I need to eat my food as fast as possible so I can get up for more. And I always get more.

I’ve actually gotten better at eating slower at Sweet Tomatoes (and at home, and other restaurants), but every time I go there, I eat a lot more than I should. I don’t get a stomach ache or anything like that, but I just eat too much. Because it’s a buffet. And I feel all weird and rushed. And I feel deprived. And sad. Sad that I am not eating as much as I used to at a buffet, before I started caring about my health.

Today I was thinking about what it would be like to stop counting calories and just listen to my hunger. What would happen if I ate when I was hungry, rather than sticking to the allotted meals and snacks I have set up for myself throughout the day? Would I eat less? Would I eat more? Would I lose weight? Would I gain weight?

I really want to do that – stop counting, stop worrying. Stop thinking about it. But I don’t think I am ready. I really don’t think I am ready to live that guilt-free of a life. I have been having some binging issues lately. I’ve been avoiding some emotions, and eating them out instead. I feel that, until I conquer emotional eating, I may not be ready to listen to my hunger, because I am not really listening to it. I am letting my emotions dictate my eating patterns. And that just feels awful.

I am just going to see how the next few weeks go. This is a stressful time for me. I’d still like to lose some weight, and I think counting calories may be the way to do that. Oh, and avoiding the buffet.

On the side: PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE someone help me with wordpress. I could not login to my admin panel tonight for a very long time. It just kept resetting every time I entered my login and password. I tried a million things to fix it, and nothing worked very well. I am not sure what finally got it.