Restored

Walking to Gylen Castle

Ten days in Scotland did a lot to restore the happier, more hopeful Catherine.  I'm already planning a return trip.

These Are A Few Of My Favorite Things

Uh-oh, am I an adult now?

I just bought a house.

I had a giddy look on my face the whole time I was signing the papers. Now all I'm thinking about is numbers.

I'll post more next week, when I'm safely tucked into my little haven.

Gratitude

New gardens
Blue skies
Conditioner that smells like coconut
Paint chips and hope
Health
Easter bonnets

Marcus at Maymont

New Year

I will be a better person this year. Promise.

The Stare's Nest By My Window

The bees build in the crevices
Of loosening masonry, and there
The mother birds bring grubs and flies.
My wall is loosening; honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

We are closed in, and the key is turned
On our uncertainty; somewhere
A man is killed, or a house burned.
Yet no clear fact to be discerned:
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

A barricade of stone or of wood;
Some fourteen days of civil war:
Last night they trundled down the road
That dead young soldier in his blood:
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

We had fed the heart on fantasies,
The heart's grown brutal from the fare,
More substance in our enmities
Than in our love; O honey-bees,
Come build in the empty house of the stare.

(W. B. Yeats)


One of my favorite poems. Love the cadence. Love the images. That last stanza absolutely slays me.

Blogging My Fat: Week 7 (?)

I think this is week seven. And boy, I have made a piss-poor effort this month. The rugby season has ended, which means it is entirely up to me to move. Entirely up to me. Bah!

Blogging My Fat: Week 5.5

I haven't really had a fire lit under my gigantic butt yet about this weight loss thing, not even with the scary bet I have going with my parents. You'd think the threat of having to hang out with my dad every evening for a month to talk politics would have me racing towards the track most evenings after work. Maybe my lack of motivation stems from all the late meetings I have been having at City Hall or the nasty sinus infection that has kept me out of work for the last couple of days. Nahh, it is probably just that being fat is too darn easy. Crave a double cheeseburger? Hit up the drive-thru. Need a quick jolt of sugar for those sleepy afternoon hours in front of the computer monitor? Vending machines on G-12 and the observation deck. Fail to set aside time to pack a healthy lunch? You can take your pick from all of the lunch carts within a three block radius, hoof it to some super restaurant in Shockoe Bottom, or go the really lazy route and find something at the deli downstairs.

I need to find something to push me beyond this apathy. Here are some reasons I want to lose weight, in no real order:

- to inspire my tubby family members
- get a smokin' body
- relive my former rugby glory days
- better skin
- cuter clothes
- keep the diabetes that runs rampant in my family at bay
- be able to run a marathon

Sunshine

This lady has been singing the blues lately. I don't know if it is the crazy weight gain, 10111 Epsilon, or the fact that I only seem to see the sun on weekends. I've decided to start eating my lunch outside in Capitol Square every day that I possibly can and see if that can help with this low-grade depression.

It felt great going out there today. I sprawled out on the freshly cut lawn, kicked off my shoes, took out a good book, and commenced reading and slurping clam chowder. (I tend not to be one of the demure bench sitters in the square. The benches encircle the statues, and the people eating lunch there look like they are a part of some quiet religious order that worships long-dead Virginia deities.) I could practically feel my body produce Vitamin D and happiness.

The only downside to these sunny lunches, I am finding, is that I desperately want to curl up and take a nap when I return to my cold, dry office.

Blogging My Fat: Week 3 or The Revenge of the Evil Coconut Cake

Eh, things could be better. Or worse.

Our coach is kicking our lazy butts into shape at rugby practice, but work has been so crazy lately that my attendance has been sporadic. It is sad to admit it, but I am the slowest girl on the team this year. That is absolutely frickin killing me. I come home from practice and tend to my wounded pride. But onward and upward! I will use this humiliating experience to push myself to greater heights. I will lose the 45 pounds I have gained since I made the MARFU U-23 All Stars team. And then I will lose more and I will flank! And then play center! (But never wing. That wouldn't be any fun.)

But first, I need to stop wolfing down coconut cakes from Ukrop's. Seriously, I should just stay away from Ukrop's. Nothing good comes from those trips. I come back from the farmers' market laden with organic, locally grown fruits and vegetables, but when I come home from the grocery store, I find my bags filled with eclairs and chips and spreads that have ingredients lists that include naughty things like cream cheese and sour cream. Things that are super processed and have been trucked in from all over the country. I definitely don't need to be putting that crap in my body.

The plan for this week:
Take measurements
Eat more yogurt
Walk on non-rugby days

10 Things

Every night I thank God for ten things before I go to bed. I thought I might share tonight's ten:

• co-workers who talk books with me
• swiffer mops
• short grass in the backyard (which means Molly is much more agreeable to going out and doing her business each morning)
• crock pots
• Mr. P calling me back with the info I needed
• Cabot seriously sharp white cheddar
• Sunshine and lunch in Capitol Square
• The squirrels around Capital Square. Dude, seriously. They will eat out of your hand.
• The Library of Virginia's digital collections
• local apples

Blogging My Fat: Week 2

Exercise gives your endorphins. Endorphins make you happy. Happy people just don't shoot their husbands.

On the upside, I've started back with rugby and have been eating more fruits and vegetables. On the downside, I can't stop shoveling food into my gob. I'm unusually blue as of late, which is making me eat more. And the more I eat, the less I move around. And the less I move, the more blue I get. It is a nasty cycle.

Goals for the week: Move more. Reread Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. Stretch. Walk Molly on a cool September morning just before the sun comes up.

Can't Escape

I think the pink and blue flowered wallpaper in Gmom's spare bedroom is about to put me over the edge. This kind of reminds me of a short story I had to read in college about this woman who slowly went crazy, and as she declines she becomes obsessed with the yellow wallpaper in her room, imagining women trapped behind the pattern, creeping around. Sometimes I feel as though all of the flowers are going to jump off of the wall and rush the bed.

It is unbelievably difficult living a life where nothing is yours. The furniture, the curtains, the pink sheets, the stacks of National Geographics, the shows she watches in the evenings. And you know you can't suggest any dramatic changes because that might upset her equilibrium. And then you feel guilty and ungrateful and even more wretched than before.

Eh, it could be worse. The wallpaper could be that shiny metallic paper with the women's turbaned heads that used to be in Grandmother Easterling's guest bathroom.

Blogging My Fat: Beginnings

The chub is getting to be a bit much. I'm going to be chronicling my weight loss on this blog each week in hopes that this very public chronicling will help hold me accountable. It looks like I'll need to lose about 80 pounds to get into a healthy range (yikes!), so this is going to be one long journey.

For the coming week, I plan on focusing on incorporating more fruits and veggies into my diet. I'll also be going back to rugby practice, which I dread because of the weight gain.

My other blog is famous!

...at least at the local level.

The Shockoe Examiner got a nice write-up in Buttermilk and Molasses. You know you have arrived in the blogging world when you are on John Sarvay's radar. Woohoo!

Now if only more than two people would read this blog. Haha!

Weekend Recap

up early - South of the James Market - gorging myself on blackberries and other yummy market finds - library - reading - taking the nephew to see Transformers 2 - pot roast supper w/ the fam - Facebook stalking - bed late - up late - church w/ the gmom - taking niece to see the otters at Maymont - hanging around in the bro's apartment (watching 30 minutes of Twilight might or might not have been involved) - Tom Collinses with the folks - laundry - bed

Experience

Some men break your heart in two,
Some men fawn and flatter,
Some men never look at you;
And that cleans up the matter.

(Dorothy Parker)

Favorite Edgar Allan Poe Poem

From childhood's hour I have not been
As others were---I have not seen
As others saw---I could not bring
My passions from a common spring.
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow; I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone;
And all I lov'd, I loved alone.
Then---in my childhood---in the dawn
Of a most stormy life---was drawn
From ev'ry depth of good and ill
The mystery which binds me still:
From the torrent, or the fountain,
From the red cliff of the mountain,
From the sun that 'round me roll'd
In its autumn tint of gold---
From the lightning in the sky
As it pass'd me flying by---
From the thunder and the storm,
And the cloud that took the form
(When the rest of Heaven was blue)
Of a demon in my view.

Happiness Is...

Fresh blackberries from the South of the James Market

Sunday night thunderstorms

Amazing the Gmom with online bridal registries

Low-fat squash casserole that tastes just like the full-fat version

Zinnias for the office

Spooning with my dog

Blogging History

Hey, I've gotten involved with a group of history nerds, and we're joining forces to blog about the history of our fair city. Check us out: theshockoeexaminer.blogspot.com