micah 6:8

i feel like a shepherd who's sent his sheep out to graze and cannot remember what pasture he put them in. seriously, it's a mess inside my head. there were moments today when i thought i'd drive myself mad....but then this came to me, plain as day:

He has showed you, o man, what is good.
and what does the LORD require of you?
to act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly with your God.

ask me—have i been doing that lately? not very well, my friends. not very well. i really needed some clarity today. more than anything, that is what makes me well...what nourishes my sometimes worn out soul and reminds me of who i am.

and i gotta tell ya, even despite everything, that's not bad for a monday....

slug in the city

okay, so the day is nearer to being over than not, and i really haven't gotten as much done as i had hoped i would. i mean, yes, i made some green tea muffins (trader joe's mix), loaded and ran the dishwasher, worked on freelance, took a nap, and watched a movie, but i can't help but feel like a slacker.

oh, and i also went through some mail and shredded a bunch of credit card offers (i love my shredder!). plus, i had a grilled turkey and provolone sandwich with a layer of cranberry sauce tucked inside (really good, but i still don't feel very well) for a late lunch. i would contemplate dinner, but i don't particularly want to eat anything else. i don't have much of an appetite just now, and i'm trying to roll with it.

i must say - i'm not loving the fact that tomorrow means back to the grind, but until i absolutely have to leave my home, i'm going to hunker down under some blankets and listen to the rain and wind swirling furiously outside my window. it's drafty in my apartment, but there are a few thoughts keeping me warm tonight, not the least of which is that i am loved beyond measure...even if i am a lazy bum.

maroon 5 knows what i'm talking about....

so apparently the days of balmy weather are over. this morning, it is dank and overcast and makes me VERY glad i went grocery shopping last night. in fact, i can speak from personal experience to my gladness, because i just had to go out in the ick to retrieve the rest of my nonperishable items from the trunk of my car, and being out there for even 2 minutes was unbelievably unpleasant.

with that being said, i'm now drying off in the comfort of my cozy, dimly-lit apartment and loving the fact that the whole of sunday stretches out before me with possibility. heck, i'm feeling so good about it, i might even bake something!

i'm feeling listy.

here we go....

1. salimah's thesis is pretty much finished. it's been such a long process, i feel like i should get a master's degree along with her:).
2. i'm writing this blog entry with dan fogelberg's 'leader of the band' as a backdrop. classic.
3. i was supposed to go out for sushi tonight, but i can't really stomach it (literally).
4. it still amazes me how much fake bling makes me happy—even on a saturday spent kicking about at home.
5. salimah and i planned out our thanksgiving day menu. i can't wait to get cooking!
6. i've had some epiphanies in the last day or so about my perspective on 'belonging.'
7. i'm having some weird attachment to old oprah magazines. i think i need an intervention.
8. next weekend i'm slated to have a tapas lunch with two old friends.
9. i'm making a late-night grocery shopping trip tonight to wegman's. i'm actually rather stoked.
10. i'm NOW writing this blog entry with the song 'it's hard out here for a pimp' from the hustle and flow soundtrack as the backdrop. not classic, per se, but a whole different kind of fun.

i got nothing left. see ya sunday.

the brewer's art

tonight, i spent the evening just as it should be: out to dinner with friends, enjoying lovely food, good wine, and conversation that had even fellow patrons drinking that extra cup of coffee just to make sure they heard the end of one trail or another.

now, unfortunately, i'm feeling a little less than stellar. oh well....no matter. i still must tell what i ate:

fig and goat cheese crêpe (that had been fried crisp)
braised beef short ribs with a mushroom-potato concoction (all i know is that there was cream involved)
lemon tarte with fresh berries (it was TRULY a tart tarte - so citrusy and delightful)
pinot noir (a light and smooth complement)

honestly, right up until the moment that i started to notice that i was in pain, i was loving that kind of evening that only single women can have. it was, quite simply, the perfect entrée into the weekend (pun very much intended).

while it is still called today....

i've tried concocting a blog post three times tonight but have come up with nada. so now that there is less than 5 minutes left of thursday, i'm putting a li'l something out here just to acknowledge that i am, in fact, still participating in nablopomo:).

sometimes there's not much more to say than that.

oh, well, i DID speak too soon about my stomach issues being resolved last night. after my last blog post, i had a minor relapse. but today seemed more even, and i actually managed to eat some turkey and a banana, both of which are decidedly non-carby items [read: not saltines].

i watched the break-up tonight. not the best film ever, but i'm a fan of vince vaughn and jen aniston, so it was a rather enjoyable hour and 45 minutes of my time.

and now that the clock is about to strike midnight, i'm OUT.

it bears mentioning

today's blog title is a nod to my best pal, because only she will get it, but either way, it's still applicable....

(in no particular order...)

• the more serious elements of my illness seem to have mostly passed, although i'm still dealing with vestiges.


• my nails are so long, i almost feel like i have fake ones (this is so unusual for me - you don't even know).


• i'm a huge, unembarrassed fan of 'the biggest loser.' it makes me feel like i want a theme song to play whenever i do something particularly swell or triumphant.


• my foot is seriously hurting.


• this election has made me realize that i care way more about politics than i ever thought i did.


• lately, when i get very flustered, i've taken to lisping (not on purpose).


• i got a flu shot today and, surprisingly, i've had very few side-effects.


• i'm kind of obsessed with drinking slightly frozen grapefruit juice, and as soon as i can tolerate acids again, i'm running out and buying myself at least 3 bottles.


• i mean it. my nails are really long.


• long nails go well with fake bling.

okay, that is all.

thank God for saltines and ginger ale....

well, it seems that i'm nearly out of the woods from my stomach ailment (although not fully - the nausea and stomach cramping still come in waves from time to time). i did go back to work today, and i felt rather proud of myself for making it through the day without getting violently ill (yay me).

that's pretty pitiful, actually.

in other news, salimah and i did round 2 of thesis brainstorming. it's coming along rather nicely, i feel.

also - and, yes, i understand how TRULY random this is - i have the song 'breakout' by swing out sister (just the chorus) LODGED FIRMLY in my mind. may i just say - life is cruel sometimes.

my stomach is a mess

i feel nauseated and wretched this morning, so i'm at home, trying to nurse myself back to health with some fitful sleep and advil (because my head is also pounding). i'm about to go make some hot tea, but i fear it's not exactly what i need.

i'm not psyched about a week that starts off this way....

words get in the way

after a several-hour-long thesis revision session with salimah yesterday afternoon, i managed to get nothing done that could be considered by most people as productive. i mean, sure, i napped, but i didn't wind up doing any editing. oh, and i burned my dinner (but you best believe i ate it anyway).

today, on the other hand, i've been a little editing machine. and i've even managed to sneak in a viewing of the prizewinner of defiance, ohio, which - i must say - is QUITE a charming film. julianne moore does a great 50s housewife. i think this is at least the third movie of hers in which she plays that exact role. anyway, i thoroughly enjoyed it. an enthusiastic two thumbs up.

i just looked at the clock and realize that i have about 6 more hours of working until my eyes will, in all likelihood, give out, so i'm back to the grind.

life is short. eat peanut butter first.

while my dinner of turkey tenderloins stuffed with a dried cherry/cornbread/cashew stuffing is finishing up in the oven, i (being the hungry, early lunch eater that i am) am relishing a bowl of reese's puffs. not health food, mind you, but delightful every so often.

and while i am on the topic of healthful bits, i would like to announce that my skim milk tastes suspiciously like the cardboard carton from whence it came. not ideal, i can assure you.

since i've had a delicious nap on my new mattress, the plan for the evening is work, work, work and maybe a bit of movie-watching as a backdrop. whatever it is, it must go well with technical manual jargon and the scratching of my red pen. i'm thinking something with mark ruffalo...i find him marvy.

morning has (not quite) broken

UGH! i tried several times last night to post yesterday's entry on time, but blogger was giving me problemos (and, i might say, this has been happening much too frequently of late). so now it's 6:20 a.m. and i thought i'd try again (and it worked, apparently). but why - you may ask - am i up this early on a saturday morning? well, to be honest, i just had this auditory dream that freaked me out. i am telling you - i heard one loud RING of a phone (which is especially odd, since i don't have a regular phone anymore) and then nothing. it was enough to actually wake me out of what, to me, felt like a dead sleep.

in more pleasant news, i'm getting new mattresses today. a coworker is selling a practically new set of them - in the size of my current bed - and it was too great of a deal to pass up. my current mattress is 10 years old (i bought it right after college), and it's just DEAD. and my back...my poor back...has been suffering because of it for quite awhile now.

SO, this will at least tide me over until i decide to upgrade to a bigger bed someday (if/when i can ever afford it). and, in the meantime, i plan on getting my SLEEP ON....

but for now, i need a shower and some hot tea. the sun's not even up yet. *shudder*

it's friday, i'm in love

okay, well, not really. i just had that in my head for awhile today. but i must say, i'm practically in love with friday and all that it entails. i mean, who doesn't love getting to leave work for two WHOLE days? there's that anticipation i get every week....the feeling that anything's possible. i swear, i'm so 'old musical'-oriented that the one line from that song from the sound of music always runs through my head: 'what will this day be like, i wonder...'

yes, it's true....weekends, even busy ones, hold that much promise for me.

i need to get out more.

raising the bar

in a strange twist of events, it's storytime here at always greener....

once upon a time, there was a girl who always wanted to be married. she wanted it so much, in fact, that she considered its possibilities with every boy she ever met. even the ones she didn't like that much. (she later learned that this was, in fact, a result of her raging insecurity, but that's outside the scope of today's story.)

the girl settled for relationships in which she was not very high on the priority list, because she felt that if someone didn't make an honest woman out of her by the time she was twenty-one, she might implode. (really, she felt it MUST be true.) but, as things often go for girls like this, none of her relationships came to fruition.

around the time the girl was about to turn twenty-one, she met a boy who made all of her come to life. something about the things in his heart seemed so well-matched to hers that she was all too happy to overlook the multitude of practical things standing in the way of the two of them marrying and living happily ever after (not the least of which was a family who was strongly against this union). the girl thought that finally, something real and good and 'forever' was happening in her life, and so what if it took another year or two past twenty-one? she was going to have her dream-come-true after all!

BUT, the boy with the shining heart turned out to be more scared and broken than the girl even realized and, after a year or more of agony, things ended...badly. and then hope glimmered again after a bit more time had passed...and then they ended again...even more badly than before.

the girl walked away from the situation bruised and bewildered, wondering how it was possible that someone so 'perfect' for her could turn out to be so wrong. hadn't she waited long enough? hadn't she tried to be all the things she knew to be so that he would love her back? didn't she deserve something good - something real and beautiful?

for the next few years, the girl's heart slowly mended, but even despite all the time that passed, she never forgot the boy. she couldn't. no one else came even remotely close to meeting her gaze the way that he did. when other boys spoke, she could see they were funny or smart, but none of them had the spark that made her light up like that boy. you see, the bar had been raised for her, and she knew that whomever she would eventually marry would have to be as good...or BETTER...than the boy who had stolen her heart those years before.

after some time had passed, the girl found a lovely boy and they began a slow but progressing relationship, talking of marriage and children and all the things the girl had always wanted. and while she felt excited by this and hoped that maybe...just maybe...things would turn out in her favor this time, the new boy still didn't make the bar. don't misunderstand, though - she wanted him to. she wanted SO much for him to be the one who would finally match her MORE than the first boy. but he never did. and what was more difficult was that, in the mean time, the first boy married. the girl had her answer: it would never be after all. never, ever.

after five years, the girl's relationship ended. and, of course, her heart began wandering back to the first boy...to the things he was...and wondering what might have been. but something about the girl had changed. she wasn't that same helpless, needy soul she had once been. she was so much stronger, self-assured, even, and she didn't look at every man as a potential mate now. and, what was more, even though the bar had not moved from its place, she was beginning to know deep inside of her that the first boy wasn't really what she wanted after all. she had grown past that place, those desires, into someone who knew she deserved more than that. and she also started to realize that someday, someone would come and surpass that first boy. she found it a little hard to believe, but her hope told her it was so....

so, she began to wait.

eventually, just when she least expected it, a boy did come...and not just quietly, but barreling into her life...and before the girl knew what hit her, any thoughts of that bar were practically foreign to her. the new boy had shown her things and opened her eyes in ways that she couldn't have anticipated. the girl was dumbfounded. she almost didn't want to believe it could be so, but maybe her heart had finally found its match after all?

sadly, the girl was met with more disappointment...and a heart more bruised and bewildered than before. but again, something new and strong had taken hold, and even though she was sad and she cried quite a lot, she also KNEW that she would be all right. and the hope - which, really, was much wiser than she - reminded her that someday, there wouldn't be a need to raise the bar...that someday, all the things she was supposed to have would come together. but until that time, the girl was to carry on, holding the hope around her to keep her warm when the world felt especially cold and lonely (as it often does).

and whenever the girl sits in her quiet apartment, she realizes that, these days, it isn't so much that she just wants to be married (all imploding aside), but more that she wants to share all the years of hoping and changing and growing with someone who was doing all those same things while waiting for her somewhere in the world. and when she finds him, they'll raise the bar together.

the end.

bling in november!

so, after work today, i had an appointment with my friend ness to go to the mawl and get some random stuff. so, she went to macy's and i headed to williams-sonoma so i could get these two cake pans i've been really needing. after those minor errands, we were on our way out when i spotted this fun purse/jewelry/accessories store i like, and in we went. now, normally, i don't purchase things when i go in there. i just ooh and ahh and wish i had the guts to wear some of the fun stuff.


but today, i decided to throw caution to the wind and just go for it. so, here's the watch i bought....







i also got two rings with huge stones. unfortunately, they don't have pics of them on their web site, but one of them looks suspiciously like this....



it may not be real, but people, it's super fun, and i've got mad shine the likes of which i assure you i truly, truly deserve....

november 1

here's my first nablopomo post. i'm still not up on the list as of last night, but perhaps that will change on the list!!

i awoke at 5:15 this morning on my own. i don't know what's up with me these days, but i kind of like it. it's amazing what happens when you cease activity after about 8 pm. it gives your brain time to shut off for the night so you can actually rest. at least, this is my theory for now.

gotta get ready for work. must be out the door in 20 minutes.

happy november, peops!

freak or genius? you decide.

okay, the truth is i don't like halloween. i'm not what you'd call a 'participator.' and i'm not trying to be a debbie downer or whatever, but i'm just really not into it. all the costumes and candy and 'boo' and all that...it's just not really me.

so, you can imagine how thrilled i was when it was decided last week that everyone in my department was required to wear at least one item of 'costume' to this week's team lunch. but you know, i had a moment in which i thought go with it....so i did.

as a result—and because i am a complete freak/genius—i dressed up as the seven-year itch (the costume consisted of a timeline and a back-scratcher).

only 3 people got it (and they were all over 50), but their laughter was well worth it...let me tell ya.

fall back: turkey bacon and ennui

this morning, i woke up at 6:30 (new time), read some articles and blogs for a bit, and then made breakfast for me and salimah (she stayed over last night). it was nice to be up early, being productive and feeling like i was getting a jumpstart on my day.

now i have a load of laundry brewing in suds and, thanks to a combination of bath and body works products, i smell like vanilla cookies and cinnamon. oh, and i'm drinking a skim chai from starbucks.

if it weren't for the fact that i feel kind of blah, i suppose all of those things would equal a good morning so far. we'll see how the rest of the day shakes out....

i'm not sure whether i'm fighting something off or whether it's because fall has finally arrived and the days are getting shorter, but i cannot seem to stay awake past a decent hour at night lately. in fact, i'm lucky if i make it to 9:00. and i gotta tell ya - it's cramping my style....or, more appropriately, my ability to get ANYTHING DONE.

today i'm preparing lunch for me, my parents, and salimah. we're having salmon with creamy tamarind sauce, romaine salad with balsamic vinaigrette (grape tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots, etc.), brown rice with caramelized portabella mushrooms and green onions, and strawberries for dessert.

now then, my parents are set to arrive here in about 4 hours, so i've got to get a move on....

nablopomo


i have decided to do something a bit wackadoo. actually, it's not technically wackadoo, but given my insane schedule of late, it has caused me to question my own sanity a bit. i am going to attempt full-on participation in national blog posting month (nablopomo), which means that i will post once a day to my blog for every day in november.

i cannot promise pith, dear readers, but i shall TRY to provide you with something of substance as often as possible. deal?

wish me the best....