Team Orange

On Wednesday night, our office soccer team fell once again, but not as hard this time. Read about all the follies here.

If you do, you'll notice that in the first paragraph, it mentions that Chris has the flu. He's now on the mend, and I'm hoping it's not like the one my sister has. She's had the flu for a week, and it got so bad that her ears bled. Yikes.

This nasty little bug seems to be going around right now. Please don't come for me next. Please?

Things you never wanted to know about me

- I finally got snow boots yesterday. They're cute and warm and comfy. But having something around my calves is a constant reminder that I haven't shaved my legs in who knows how long.

- Over the past two days, every time I blow my nose, a little blood comes out.

- After getting out of the shower this morning, I felt like I had forgotten to do something, but I couldn't figure out what. After getting dressed and doing my make-up, I started to do my hair, which wasn't behaving normally. That's when I remembered which step I missed in my morning routine: I forgot to wash my hair. Those of you out there with thick hair don't understand, but me? I've got really fine hair, and when I don't wash it, it's super greasy. But, I was running late for work, so I just left it that way.

- This morning on the train, I sat on some girl's lap because I lost my balance while trying to sit down.

- I always laugh at other people when they do that.

This is what the childless do

I made a little present for my co-workers this week. Well, not all my co-workers. Just the dog-owners.

It's a calendar featuring pictures of employees' dogs and their dogs' birthdays.

You might remember that our company's slogan is "How do you connect?" I answered that question on the calendar's cover:



The whole thing was a big hit because, with the exception of two dog owners at our office, none of us have human children. Our puppies are our babies.











Really, can you blame us?

I kicked things...mostly myself

I joined a co-ed soccer team at work, and we had our first game last night. It was pretty pathetic. You can read the hilarious (or hideous) highlights on that other blog I sometimes cheat on this one with.

Or, you can just read this little summary: We lost horribly, 0-12, but we looked darn cute doing it.

Self-inflicted surname abuse

A friend sent this on Facebook, and it's too awesome not to share.

Warning: Might not be safe for really conservative offices, or for people who have a problem with fish guts.

Enjoy.

New Year's Resolutions 2009

Despite my best efforts, and even tracking my efforts on this here blog, I didn't meet all my New Year's Resolutions in 2008, which were:

1. Lose 10 pounds. Didn't do that. In fact, I gained weight by the year's end. Lose 5 of those 10 by Feb. 15 (I’m heading to Aruba for a wedding the following week.) Only lost 3 ... which I promptly gained back.

2. Drink at least 64 oz. of water a day. (I've already started working on this one. It has increased my bathroom usage by 33%) Sorta lost track. But I drink a ton of water, so I'm good.

3. Run a 5k in less than 30 minutes. Didn't happen. I think my best time was around 33 minutes.

4. Run at least 500 miles total this year. Once again, lost track. But I'm pretty sure I got nowhere near that number. I probably ended up in the 100 range. Maybe more.

5. Reduce emails in inbox to less than 250. Never happened.

6. Email or call at least one friend or family member other than Chris each day. (I’m horrible at keeping in touch with people.) I'm still horrible.

7. Floss daily. Nope.

8. Read at least 15 books I haven’t read before. (Cookbooks don’t count). Started out great, but got stuck at The Iliad. Like, 6 months ago.

9. Pay off credit card debt. I did this one!! I am debt free (well, except for that pesky mortgage, which bring me to...)

10. Buy a house. Done, done, done!


2.5 for 10 ain't so good. So, for 2009, I'm only making one resolution. Well, maybe three.

1. Find a beat.

Not like this, but rather a newspaper beat, but for my personal life. Basically, I need something to be passionate about.

I'm a generalist; I know a little bit about everything. But, outside of work, I'm not really, deeply into anything. In fact, when I'm not at work, I'm either thinking about work, or zoning in front of the television, often watching football, because I was in a football pool at work.

I wouldn't consider myself a workaholic, but I like my job. I enjoy going to the office everyday, and I don't feel a huge urge to bolt for the door at 5 p.m.

But, when I think about my former lives, I used to be a much more well-rounded individual. In high school, I played soccer, went on cycling trips, was active in my church, did theatre, played trumpet in the band, was really into piano, and followed around various boyfriends and their rock and/or punk and/or death metal bands.

These days, other than my backside, I'm not so well-rounded. Next week, I'll start playing soccer with a work team, but otherwise, not too much going on.

The thing is, I don't feel like my life is boring. I don't feel unfulfilled. But, I also don't have that fire about anything. I need some fire.

2. Redesign my Web site. It looks pretty bad. If we're currently in a Web 2.0 world, my site is like, Web 0.5.

3. Start volunteering somewhere. Actually, I'm pretty sure I know where I want to volunteer, I just need to get off my butt and actually make the effort.

Hopefully, by greatly reducing my expectations of myself, I can actually accomplish my resolutions this year. But we'll see.

Chris' 30th, part 2

So, as I mentioned (and publicly humiliated Chris) earlier, he turned 30 last week.

I really, really wanted to throw him a 30th birthday party, for a few reasons. First, in his 30 years, Chris has never had a birthday party because it falls halfway between Christmas and New Year's. I can somewhat relate to this as my birthday is on New Year's Day. However, instead of never having a birthday party, I always have a birthday party, whether my New Year's Eve hosts planned for it or not.

So, a few years ago, I realized that Chris' 30th would fall on a Saturday, and I figured that was the ultimate sign that I should throw him a huge 30th birthday party. I'm not a fan of surprises, so I let Chris know about my little plan. Initially, he was all about it, but then he started to waffle on where to have the party, and then he started to question who to invite, and eventually, he decided he didn't want a party at all. And then, because he's pretty good at reading my mind, he said that under no circumstances am I to throw him a party, with or without his knowledge. Apparently, he didn't realize that this party was all about ME anyway. But whatever, I decided to abide.

So, with no party to plan, I turned my attention toward his gift. It had to be something big, but not ridiculously expensive because we just bought a house and have all kinds of big purchases already on the horizon, like a new furnace, and air conditioning, and new windows that don't let all that wonderful and insanely expensive heating and cooling seep out.

And it had to be something memorable. And useful. And fun. And perfect.

Obviously, this cannot be accomplished with one gift. Plus, one gift wouldn't give me the opportunity to obsessively plan things and make lists, which just might be my most favorite task, second only to checking things off lists.

So, I decided to give him 30 gifts, throughout his 30th year. I started a little scrapbook for him* to document all the things, food, experiences, trips, etc. I give him over the next year to celebrate his 30th year.

This year of gift-giving started last Friday, when he received gifts No. 1-5:

1. A massage. (He hasn't had a massage since 2004. Since then, he's graduated from law school, lived briefly with my parents, studied for, took and passed the Illinois bar, got a job, got engaged, got married, became an uncle, moved four times and bought a house. So, he was due.)

2. New clothes.

3. Dinner at one of his favorite tapas restaurants.

4. A new book.

5. Going to see "Gran Torino."

Then, on Saturday, I made him gift No. 6: Stuffed cabbage.

Gifts No. 7-30 are still in the planning phase. Some will be surprises. Some won't -- like a trip we're taking to New York later this month. Some I haven't even thought about yet. But, I plan to write about them all here.


* uh, yeah, totally for me