...and a valuable lesson was learned

Heeyyyy friends! Well, it has obviously been a while since I've written anything here. I'll try to get through this catchup business so we can get to the good stuff like concerts I've been to, musings about teaching yoga and other stuff that's been on my mind lately.

Before we go any further though can I just say, this winter is straight up ridiculous. It's either -30 or snowing...there is no middle ground here. 

Also I broke my car about a week and a half ago...and by 'I broke it' I actually mean 'dude ran a stop sign right in front of me and I couldn't stop in time'....so my lovely little Honda is now in the body shop, sans front bumper. Thankfully no one was hurt, and my stop sign-running friend was actually a decent human being who stopped to make sure I was OK, exchanged insurance info with me, and hopefully learned a valuable lesson about traffic laws. 

I did drive away, and went straight to my favorite yoga class. Good times. [Sidebar - it's possible that I should not have actually driven away nor should I have driven to the body shop a couple of days later. Dennis (the shop owner) gave me the extreme side eye and was like 'yeah...this is borderline driveable...' ) but you know, everyone is alive and OK so all's well that ends well]

In a related story, Facebook has identified the following as the defining moments of my life in 2013:

That last one is probably the most representative of my life

Here's a little somethin somethin from my Weather Puppy app. This basset hound is not pleased about the -41 windchill, and neither am I.

Nope. Do not want

A couple of weeks ago, I volunteered selling tickets for the Minneosta Bach Ensemble's winter concert which was fun times. MBE was founded last year by my former choir director (he left us to move to Boston...le sad), another former choir colleague and friend is the managing director and I know most of the musicians and soloists so I always enjoy working with them. At one point, we ran out of tickets so I started tearing up small pieces of paper and writing 'ticket' on them. Profesh.

Real tickets

Also real tickets?

That same night, I went to Hilary Hahn and Haushka's concert at Aria in Minneapolis. Aria is in the former Theatre de la Jeune Leune space in the warehouse district, and I hadn't been there since it was Jeune Lenue so it was fun to see a classical concert there. Well, classical-ish. New classical. Hauschka plays a prepared piano, which I will link to a video of in case you haven't seen this. You should...it's awesome. He also de-prepared his piano towards the end of the night and just started tossing the random objects all over the stage - fascinating and hilarious at the same time. And to top it off, the show was almost entirely improvised.

These two have an album together, Silfra, which is gorgeous and atmospheric and I definitely recommend checking it out.

Hilary Hahn and Hauschka at Aria

Last Sunday we went to Piccolo for Ben's birthday - Piccolo does very creative preparations and small plates, and it's one of our favorite spots in MSP. We shared roast carrots with fennel and bleu cheese (pictured below), lamb loin with brown butter gnocchi and mushrooms, and an oxtail terrine...and a buttermilk panna cotta for dessert which was heavenly. Favorite dessert of 2014 so far.

Yumm

And for good measure, here's what my car looked like after Thursday night's incident. Stop signs are not a joke, friends.

Yup.

Well that's all I've got for tonight! Time to 

I kind of maybe don't hate running anymore almost

I have always had a thing against running - I just find it kind of boring.  I know cardio is important etc, but the process of actually going running has just never been fun for me.  Yoga, on the other hand, I loved the second I stepped onto my mat.  I think we are just predisposed to different types of exercise and physical activity and you have to find what works for you.  For some people, running is it.  For me, it is not.

Other than a brief period last winter when I ran on the treadmill every day while traveling in Turkey, because our hotel room was too small to do yoga and the treadmill was literally the only way to any sort of physical activity, I have fastidiously avoided running for the better part of three years.

And then for some reason I signed up for the Warrior Dash.  My co-workers talked me into it, and I agreed.  Why?  I have no idea, but it probably has something to do with the fact that the WD involves fire, barbed wire and mud crawls, which seems way more fun (to me...) than the average 5K.  Shortly after I signed up I realized that oh, I haven't run in like a year.  I should probably do something about that.

So I started running, three times a week.  At first I couldn't even finish two miles without walking.  But soon, two was no big deal.  Then three.  Now I usually run a quick two miles two or three mornings during the week, and do a longer run (3.5 miles or so) on the weekends.  Now I just need to add in some inclines so the ski hills don't kill me.

Point being, I think I am actually starting to enjoy it.  Not as much as I love yoga, but I definitely don't hate it.  I've noticed that when I run in the morning, I just feel better - it changes my attitude for the whole morning.  And today it was actually kind of fun.  Who knew.

Moving on - running requires energy, and here's some of what I've been using to fuel my workouts:

~ Garden/Ktichen ~

Found these outside after choir - the best dessert :)

Arugala, egg whites and tomatoes on toast with a sprinkle of parmasean and fresh ground pepper



Summer Squash soup of the Heidi Swanson variety



~ Last Weekend at Mango Thai ~

Fresh Mango Spring Rolls

Green Curry w/ Tofu

Beer, part of a balanced meal ;)

BYOB!

Well, I hope I don't die in the Warrior Dash.  It's not for another 2.5 weeks but wish me luck anyways :)

Beer + Banana Bread = Magic

... So this happened:

WHAT

But first, my day.  Unsurprisingly I came home to a flat tire....  This morning I got up early to email my boss and let him know I was working from home today, and then I took my car down two blocks to our neighborhood repair shop, and then came home and got set up at my home "office" aka the couch.

When I dropped my car off, I asked them to also give me an oil change, and to take a look and see if anything else was amiss.  Well.  That was obviously my first mistake, because they called me back a few hours later and quoted me almost $3,000 worth of work.  Lovely.

Obviously I'm taking it in for a second quote, but still...bleh.  I guess when your car gets to be 12 years old these things happen, but I always told myself that the next time I needed to pay more than $1,000 to fix my car I'd just start looking for another car.  I'm not sure I'm quite ready for that yet...so I have some decisions to make I guess :/

To top it all off, I went out over lunch and bought Mini a special treat of CANNED FOOD.  I was so excited to give it to her but apparently she was not as excited, because she totally refused to eat it.  I left her dish there for several hours, because I figured that when she got hungry she'd eat, but it went untouched until after 8pm at which point I threw it out and gave her her normal food.

Jerk.  See if I ever spend $1.29 on dinner for you again.

she eats plastic, but she will not eat cat food...

Anyways, after I finished up with work I ran a quick 2 miles, showered, walked Sid and then drove to Minneapolis for dinner and drinks at St. George and the Dragon!  This place just opened in Minneapolis and I've really been looking forward to checking it out. 

First up was the Banana Bread Beer, which...wow. Just about awesome.

I really loved just about everything about this place, especially the kids book corner.  I would have LOVED this when I was little...

custom built for nerds

DRAGON BURGER.  Made with 100% real dragon.

After dinner, we kinda wanted cookies.  But, I was too lazy to bake, so Sweet Martha's frozen cookie dough to the rescue!!  I also made several attempts at getting a photo with the cookie dough, all of which were epic fails



...yeeeah... no...




still no



Artsy?

Oh and just thought I'd share...last week I finally got around to decorating the porch!  The furniture and the string lights are from Target, the lantern is from Patina and the trunk I've had for at least 10 years.  It was my tack trunk when I used to ride horses but now I use it to store blankets...and as a table :)

Tomorrow I'm headed into work for what turned out to be my only day in the office!  Ben has a school event tomorrow night so I'll be bacheloretting it up with the pets - maybe some yoga and baking, who knows?  Happy almost Friday!

Helloooo there!!

Well hi!  Long time no chat, so to speak.  It's been pretty busy around here for the last week or so what with Valentine's day and all the birthdays, and the british soap operas which required my undivided attention.  To quickly summarize:

What I have not been up to:

- Blogging

- Reading nearly enough

- Following the Republican primaries

What I have been up to:- A lot of yoga

- A LOT of work...

- Celebrating my mom's birthday

- Celebrating my dad's birthday
- Celebrating my birthday
- Wasting time on facebook
- Baking cake
- Eating cake
- Watching squintillions of hours of Downton Abbey while consuming said cake

Internet time suck strikes again

And oh yeah... last Thursday was my 29th birthday!  It was totally not a big deal, but some of my work friends were mad that I didn't say anything, so we're going to celebrate together next week when we travel to the thrilling locale of north Texas.  

After work, I hit up a hot yoga class, and came home to find a freshly-baked batch of cookies and a home cooked meal courtesy of my wonderful husband :)  Mini decided to help with some chores, and even Sidney somehow found the time to make me a card, despite his lack of language skills and opposable thumbs.

I help u.

Happy B-Day!  I didn't pee on the floor today!

Pasta Carbonara

On Friday, we went out to dinner with my parents and my mom's friend Pat, who was visiting from Portland.  Pat and my mom have been friends since before I was born - she was like an aunt to me growing up, and is definitely an honorary member of our family.  It was really a joint Birthday celebration - my parents and I all have birthdays in the first half of February, and over the years we've moved towards more of a joint celebration than celebrating them all separately.

We went to Blackbird, which was fantastic as usual.  I had the celery root and mushroom risotto, which was amaaaazing.  Ben got the Walleye Po Boy, my parents both ordered Orichette, and Pat had the Cassoulet - definitely my favorite dish at the table besides my own :)  After dinner we walked back to our place for coffee and cake.

All of us at Blackbird

On Saturday, I had some friends over for drinks and more cake.  Amanda brought a delicious chocolate mocha torte, and the makings for Blood Orange Gin Sparklers, which were fan-tastic.  And gin-tastic.  Amanda was quite generous when she poured mine.

A few friends brought beer and various snacks, and I baked a second cake - Dorie Greenspan's French Apple Cake (via David Liebowitz's blog).  It was a lovely night and we had a great time just hanging out and chatting.

In other news, it finally snowed!!  And I am obsessed with Downton Abbey and wish I could be BFF's with Dowager Countess Violet.  And that I had all of Mary Crawley's dresses.  And this week's episode of How I Met Your Mother almost made me cry.  WHAT?!?

Also the most exciting part of my day was re-entering some numbers into a spreadsheet.  They were cost-related numbers and they were much lower than expected.  It blew my mind.

My life is super exciting.

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood...

Happy Tuesday!  The worst part of the week is over!!!

So disappointed...

For at least 10-15 seconds during yoga tonight, I somehow managed to convince myself that it was Saturday. The realization that it was, in fact, Sunday night came as a rude awakening. In any case, we had a great (if too short) weekend. Friday night involved a lot of this:

Curled up on the couch with Community, a warm and comforting bowl of soup, my amazing husband and two fuzzy friends - a great, relaxing start to the weekend!

The soup is Heidi Swanson's "A Good Soup for the Sick" from 101 cookbooks - I added kale and collards for some greenery

dawww.....

DAWWWW....

Since we adopted Sidney, we've gotten into the habit of getting up early on Saturday so we can take him for a good long walk. There are three necessary components for a successful Saturday morning walk - coffee, a puppy, and a beautiful lake path. Check, check, annnnd check!

8oz Black Miel from Bull Run - my favorite drink from my favorite local coffee shop!

Lake Calhoun

And puppy :)

Sid behaved himself quite well, and only barked at a couple of other dogs. His interactions with his peers are quite odd - when he meets another dog, he's fine until they've been sniffing at each other for a few seconds. Then, he flips out and starts barking like crazy...but when we remove him from the offending dog's presence he starts whining like "hey guysss why are we leaving our new friend?!?" So we've come to the conclusion that he doesn't actually hate other dogs, he just has terrible social skills. Barking = friend making...right? No, Sid. False. We'll get there.

We went to two parties on Saturday night - I really wanted to spend time with both groups of people and would have preferred to stay for all of both parties...but I didn't want to miss either so we had to split our time. We started out at my friend Ellie's place for a potluck with a few friends of mine from grad school. The food was fantastic, but the highlight was definitely Ellie's dramatic reading of... well... I don't want to get into too many details, but let's just say it was hilarious.

"...the accused then plugged his nose and proceeded to jump in to the water, yelling 'I'm not scared of you!"

From there, we headed north of downtown to my friend Emily's place for board games and wine! It was a great time. I know board games sounds totally dorky...and it is...I'll own my dorkishness any day. Only great things can come from an awesome group of people, a few bottles of wine, and charades. True story.

Emily, Tyler, Amanda, Ben, Justin, Biz...good friends, good times.

Portrait of a Tyler. The bow tie confuses me.

This morning after choir, I had a great afternoon at my parents' house while Ben was running errands. I haven't been up to their place in six weeks - since I cat-sat Maggie - and I love being there in the fall. They live on a lake in the woods, and the leaves are just beautiful. I went for a walk with my parents, and then had a long chat with my sister Julianna, who was there working on her CV for grad school applications. My little sis is an adult...how did this happen??!?

In a related story, Mini has recently discovered her long-suppressed love for empty paper bags. Leave a paper bag anywhere and within approximately one nanosecond she is all over it, driven wild with excitement by the endless possibilities of a portable cavernous space with handles. Earlier this morning she managed to get her head stuck in the handle of a Whole Foods bag - unperturbed, she proceeded to wriggle her entire body through the handle.

Inspired by this earlier success, while I was gone at yoga she decided to try the same trick with a Patina bag containing my new, very glittery Christmas wreath. The result was that the wreath went for a joy ride through the living room, glitter was all up in everyone's business and I'm still picking sparkles off of the cat. Wreath is fine. Cat is bejazzled. Living room has been vacuumed... just a normal day.

The traumatized wreath

Now, Ben and I are having a Bollywood extravaganza! Homemade hyderbad-style Mango Chicken (thanks Ben!), Kurkure and a Shah Ruk Kahn film... perfection.

Yes.

Happy weekend everyone! And if you actually managed to stick it out and read this entire post about my somewhat lame and boring life...I now reward you with this photo:

The cuteness may kill you. Seriously.

Looking into the future

Having pets is giving me a terrifying preview of how I will behave as a mother.

Pets are basically like small children in that they can't tell you what they need using words, they keep you awake by jumping into your bed, crawling all over you and chewing your hair (ok maybe that's just Mini... a human child probably wouldn't do that), and sometimes your wee morning hours are spent cleaning up their messes.

He may look innocent...but...

Shockingly, the grossest mess came not from Sid, but from Mini - little angel-faced kittens can be quite disgusting. I'll skip the gory details, but let's just say that this story ended with me in the bathroom at 2am cleaning cat poo off of Mini's foot and praying that Sid was not about to start barfing all over the bed.

I have a vague recollection of saying something like "Alright kitty, you're coming with me. We've got problems." And Ben's eloquent response of "Hurmmmsnarfhsmmm?" before he rolled over and went back to sleep (honestly, I would have done the same thing if it had been the other way around. Plus he got up at 5:45 to walk the dog).

The things we do for the love of our pets. But how could you not? I mean... LOOK.

It just... I... GAHHHH cuteness. I think Mini understood what she had put me through, though, because she snuggled with me for the rest of the night and did not chew on my hair once. Yay.

And now, after that disgusting story about animal poop, I bet you really want to see pictures of some delicious food! Ben and I went out for a dinner date on Tuesday - we both had stressful days at work and just needed something to break the normal routine of "come home, crash on the couch with DVDs of Community and How I Met Your Mother while eating a PB&J." Yes this is my life. Such excitement.

Anyways, we hit up Blackbird Cafe for dinner - one of my favorite spots and the kickoff point for my bachelorette party! They've recently started focusing on small plates so I ordered two to sample: a squash-filled pasta with swiss chard and the "tender vegetables" (roasted broccoli and brussels sprouts with basil and parmasean). Both were out of this world. Ben had the shaved apple salad and walleye potstickers - I tried both, and the potstickers were good but the salad was AMAZING. Just goes to show that the best things in life are usually the simplest.

Walleye Potstickers

Buttercup Squash Pasta

There are probably veggies under all that cheese

After we returned home, my friend Amanda stopped by bearing cupcakes - halloween ghost cupcakes, no less! Hurray. The three of us chatted over dessert before hitting the hay at the ripe hour of 9:30pm. Remember how I said my life was thrilling? Still true.

Is it just me or does it look like something unfortunate happened to this ghost?

Oh and last weekend - was fantastic! It was the first weekend in a looong time that neither of us had any major committments, and we took full advantage. My friend Tessa came over on Friday night and the three of us had dinner at Crema, where we made the fun discovery that if you order 2 entrees you get 1/2 off a bottle of wine plus two free scoops of ice cream. I can get behind that. I can also get behind discreetly stashing the remainder of the bottle in my purse and sneaking it home. What?

I also destroyed this giant spider on the walk home

Ben had to finish some grading, so Tessa and I had a girls night at the movies! We went to see this at the Uptown theater - if you haven't seen this film I highly, highly recommend it. I was on the edge of my seat the entire time... this movie did such an amazing job of building a constant sense of foreboding - definitely a mindf**k. One of the best movies I've seen in a while - you know it's good if you are still thinking about it a week later.

So that's basically what I've been up to! Tonight I'm heading to a hot yoga class and prepping for a weekend's worth of Halloween festivities. It's almost heeeere....!