(Get your minds out of the gutter, please. :) )
I'm so looking forward to St. Patrick's Day. I'm proud of my heritage, even though I'm only a quarter Irish and it's not like I'm steeped in it most of the time -- my parents didn't have much tradition passed down to them, so we're mostly just generic American. I think part of it is just that I have a fondness for British/Irish things, medieval culture and songs and the like.
Sunday will be our one nod to tradition, our annual corned beef and cabbage dinner. I know, the holiday is Monday, but we tend to rearrange to make holiday dinners land on Sundays, so we have time to cook and eat and relax. And perhaps I'll celebrate Monday, too -- I've been contemplating maybe taking my mom out to lunch at The Parting Glass, get some good Irish food with some good Irish music, too, since the McKrells are playing all day.
I went to have blood work done today, which is always unpleasant. The pain of having them stick me and fuss around trying to find a workable vein is bad enough, but what's almost worse is that you have to fast beforehand, and I have really sensitive blood sugar -- by the time I got out of there, I felt like total crap, all headachey and stumbly and queasy and lousy. So I treated myself to lunch, both as a reward for getting that taken care of and as a necessity, 'cause by then, I probably wasn't capable of going all the way home and preparing something to eat.
I went to Friendly's, and I was pleased to realize that it was Friday -- so I brought back my dormant Lent tradition, "Eat A Burger Day." I like exercising my freedom to eat whatever the heck I want on any day of the year without letting anyone tell me what I can or can't have. I'm also a little amused when I catch someone sitting nearby looking over at my plate with a mournful expression as they choke down a tuna sandwich or something else fishy that they clearly don't feel like eating. Unfortunately, I can't do Eat A Burger Day like I used to, 'cause I can't get takeout for dinner at work anymore, not now that I'm at a workplace that's absurdly far from any food place at all.
Today was an exception, though, and a treat -- I even got a sundae to go with my burger, 'cause heck, I was treating myself, and besides, I was ravenous 'cause I hadn't eaten all day. I've been trying to eat a little healthier lately, though, for the most part. I've been packing vegetables in my dinners for a couple of weeks, taking a bottle of water or Vitamin Water (only 40 calories, some flavor) instead of soda and stuff like that. I've also been drinking a lot of tea lately, which I figure is probably a good thing, 'cause it's really just water, mostly, nothing really bad in that.
I blame Steve for all of this -- in a good way, of course. He's a good influence on me. I have horrible dietary habits, and I still have plenty of weaknesses for whatever tastes good and doesn't take much effort, but I'm trying. It sorta reminds me of something else he was saying the other day, about how you have to make time for things you want to do, force yourself to schedule it in. 'Cause really, when it comes down to it, if something is important, you have to make yourself do it, you just have to. Like eating better, or cooking something healthy instead of buying takeout, or getting up early and getting moving to go get something taken care of that you need to do -- you have to just force yourself, just do it. If it's important, just make it happen.
Of course, none of this is what I'm prone to do. I'm more likely to float along, put things off, do what's most appealing at the moment. But I know I need to make the effort. And this morning, I won -- I actually laid in bed for like 15 minutes, thinking "well, you could just go get that blood work done next week, or in a couple of weeks, or maybe at the end of April, and then you could just get up today and eat breakfast and not have to get going right away." And then I sorta heard Steve in the back of my head, like "no, you should get up and get this done, get it over with now, today, so it doesn't keep hanging over you while you keep putting it off. I mean, what else would you do today, anyway, if you don't get up and get going? Same thing you usually do -- make breakfast, sit around watching TV, get nothing accomplished."
I'm so looking forward to St. Patrick's Day. I'm proud of my heritage, even though I'm only a quarter Irish and it's not like I'm steeped in it most of the time -- my parents didn't have much tradition passed down to them, so we're mostly just generic American. I think part of it is just that I have a fondness for British/Irish things, medieval culture and songs and the like.
Sunday will be our one nod to tradition, our annual corned beef and cabbage dinner. I know, the holiday is Monday, but we tend to rearrange to make holiday dinners land on Sundays, so we have time to cook and eat and relax. And perhaps I'll celebrate Monday, too -- I've been contemplating maybe taking my mom out to lunch at The Parting Glass, get some good Irish food with some good Irish music, too, since the McKrells are playing all day.
I went to have blood work done today, which is always unpleasant. The pain of having them stick me and fuss around trying to find a workable vein is bad enough, but what's almost worse is that you have to fast beforehand, and I have really sensitive blood sugar -- by the time I got out of there, I felt like total crap, all headachey and stumbly and queasy and lousy. So I treated myself to lunch, both as a reward for getting that taken care of and as a necessity, 'cause by then, I probably wasn't capable of going all the way home and preparing something to eat.
I went to Friendly's, and I was pleased to realize that it was Friday -- so I brought back my dormant Lent tradition, "Eat A Burger Day." I like exercising my freedom to eat whatever the heck I want on any day of the year without letting anyone tell me what I can or can't have. I'm also a little amused when I catch someone sitting nearby looking over at my plate with a mournful expression as they choke down a tuna sandwich or something else fishy that they clearly don't feel like eating. Unfortunately, I can't do Eat A Burger Day like I used to, 'cause I can't get takeout for dinner at work anymore, not now that I'm at a workplace that's absurdly far from any food place at all.
Today was an exception, though, and a treat -- I even got a sundae to go with my burger, 'cause heck, I was treating myself, and besides, I was ravenous 'cause I hadn't eaten all day. I've been trying to eat a little healthier lately, though, for the most part. I've been packing vegetables in my dinners for a couple of weeks, taking a bottle of water or Vitamin Water (only 40 calories, some flavor) instead of soda and stuff like that. I've also been drinking a lot of tea lately, which I figure is probably a good thing, 'cause it's really just water, mostly, nothing really bad in that.
I blame Steve for all of this -- in a good way, of course. He's a good influence on me. I have horrible dietary habits, and I still have plenty of weaknesses for whatever tastes good and doesn't take much effort, but I'm trying. It sorta reminds me of something else he was saying the other day, about how you have to make time for things you want to do, force yourself to schedule it in. 'Cause really, when it comes down to it, if something is important, you have to make yourself do it, you just have to. Like eating better, or cooking something healthy instead of buying takeout, or getting up early and getting moving to go get something taken care of that you need to do -- you have to just force yourself, just do it. If it's important, just make it happen.
Of course, none of this is what I'm prone to do. I'm more likely to float along, put things off, do what's most appealing at the moment. But I know I need to make the effort. And this morning, I won -- I actually laid in bed for like 15 minutes, thinking "well, you could just go get that blood work done next week, or in a couple of weeks, or maybe at the end of April, and then you could just get up today and eat breakfast and not have to get going right away." And then I sorta heard Steve in the back of my head, like "no, you should get up and get this done, get it over with now, today, so it doesn't keep hanging over you while you keep putting it off. I mean, what else would you do today, anyway, if you don't get up and get going? Same thing you usually do -- make breakfast, sit around watching TV, get nothing accomplished."
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