SUNDAY CURRENTLY // VOL. 4

 R E A D I N G 

If I stay (and the sequel, Where She Went) for book club- a club that sort of impromptu started as a result of an Instagram photo but I hope we can keep it going! Last month we read Brain on Fire and even talked about the book for 20 minutes, which I really consider a success. ;-)

 L I S T E N I N G 

to TJ chewing on his toenails...and Dateline Mysteries is on in the background.

 T H I N K I N G 

It's high time I start really planning for both of our upcoming trips! We have a hotel for Rome, and hotels for Seattle/Tacoma, but I want to do more research on the "what" to do- I do have Italy pretty well scouted but there's always more to be done.

 W I S H I N G 

I had a laundry fairy. It's gotten to the point where my laundry is SO out of control it'll take about 3 loads to do so I avoid it and it mounts and really I just want to buy all new clothes and give up. I realize some of you are laughing at this because it doesn't sound like a lot... but M and I still do our own clothes and with no kids, typically laundry is 2 loads- 1 dark 1 light, sometimes even 1 when I mash them all in together and am lazy about it. But WOOF. Idontwannaaaaaa.

 L O V I N G 

Life, lately. It's been good. I've gotten a lot of alone time to recharge (see 'wanting' re: continual weekend abandonment by my husband.. ;-) -- spent a good amount of quality time with friends and have been content for the most part.

 W A N T I N G 

This week to fly by because THREE DAY WEEKEND. We're still debating our 4th plans. M's been out of town the last 2 weekends, and 2 other weekends prior to that over the last 2 months.. so he's trending more towards "stay home" where I, as the abandonee, would like to spend some time myself at the lake. The only catch is the lake we've been invited to typically turns into a "WOO HOO PARTY!" time.. which I'm not sure I'm up for. Although as far as I know we were the only couple invited up.. so we'll see. Maybe just for a night or two. Regardless, I'm looking forward to a long weekend.

 F E E L I N G 

Really grateful. Thursday the St. Paul Fire Department honored the 5 people who saved my dad's life. The ceremony was at the YMCA where it happened. I'm not sure what my dad and I were thinking, but we imagined a super small casual ceremony in the lobby of the YCMA. Wrong, so wrong. I walked into a conference room filled with about 20 people and 4 cameras that belonged to the local news station. The Pioneer Press did a write up on it, and he was on the 6:00 news. It makes sense, everybody loves a feel good story.. and it was fantastic PR for the Fire Department and the YMCA. Apparently St. Paul is the best place to have a heart attack/cardiac arrest, as they have one of the highest survival rates in the country. It was a really neat ceremony and I'm so glad I was able to be there.

The man in the blue polo next to my dad is actually one of my dad's closest friends. He was playing handball with him the morning it happened, and is the one that performed life-saving CPR. He's always been important to our family but there's really nothing I can do to express how thankful I am for him now.

Also, I learned, another man who performed CPR- in the long sleeved yellow button up- is a fire chief in Hudson, WI (former St. Paul fire chief). It scares me to think about but he said he hadn't been to the YCMA in the morning at that hour for months due to a new schedule. It really was a case of absolutely everything going perfectly as it needed to, to save my dad. Ack, OK I need to stop.

Some other weekend snaps:

CHECKING IN

Hola!

It appears to have been a little while and I could say things that bloggers say like sorry and I missed it but meh, let's get down to it. 

So what's been happening lately? 

 Well, for starters, M and I finally tackled one item from our spring to do list and painted the front of the house. 

As you'll recall it looked like this before:

 

I'll acknowledge it's not terribly offensive... but it was time to go. 

We talked in the original post about painting the entire exterior grey and then doing dark navy or dark grey accents with white trim. 

Then when I started to contemplate how much work painting the ENTIRE house would be I thought up a solution that involved only half the effort- let's start out and paint the trim white, the window boxes and triangle navy, and then add some navy shutters and see if the brown doesn't suck so hard. 

And wouldn't ya know, it did the trick: 

We got quite a few comments from neighbors during this project that led me to believe the red was not well liked. We left the door red because it's a really nice contrast when it's closed..and it sort of accidentally looks patriotic but not too chintzy (or so I hope).

If I took a photo of the side or back of the house or the garage you'd see our secret: so far we've only painted the front. It's easy to ignore the rest for now when the curb appeal looks so much better.

What else, I've been eating some insanely delicious (and easy) meals (click photos for recipes):

and lastly, but probably most excitingly, M and I have booked trips to these places:

{photo via; Michael Riffle}

{photo via}

{photo via}

{photo via- by MPearl}

so. freakin'. excited.

Needless to say things have been pretty good lately, overall.
Now, if you don't mind, I have a super needy kitty to snuggle, a hotel in Seattle to book, and some trashy TV to watch while listening to the rain.

WHAT NOT TO DO AT THE GYM

In honor of the fact that I actually dragged myself out of bed this morning to go to the gym (for some reason it's been terribly difficult lately) I thought I'd share this super helpful post I've had drafted.

It's called, what not to do at the gym (but perhaps not what you're expecting it to say):

1. DON'T BITCH ABOUT 'YOUR SPOT' IN GROUP FITNESS
For all you know the person 'taking your spot' has been TERRIFIED of participating in a group fitness class for this very reason and has been avoiding trying one out for weeks. They finally work up the courage and there's the know-it-all gym douche shooting them daggers for stealing their 'spot'- news flash, you don't own shit at the gym, let alone a spot.

2. (on a similar note): DON'T BITCH ABOUT PEOPLE WHO BUMP INTO YOU DURING ZUMBA/BARRE/WHAT-THE-F-EVER CLASS
Again, maybe this is their first class. Maybe you should cut people some slack. Maybe not everyone can hip thrust to the beat JUST.LIKE.YOU. Maybe you are the reason they're scared to try a group fitness class. Maybe you should get over yourself.

3. DON'T TALK SHIT ABOUT PEOPLE WHO TEXT ON WORKOUT EQUIPMENT
Maybe they're having a really awful day and needed to talk to someone about it. Maybe they're figuring out logistics for dinner with their husband. WHATEVER the reason, it DOES NOT AFFECT YOU- so stop being an asshole about it.

4. DON'T JUDGE PEOPLE WHO LEAVE THEIR HAIR DOWN
This could be the ONE DAY in their ENTIRE LIFE they forgot a hair binder, but you still take it upon yourself to judge them. Maybe they have a birthmark they're embarrassed of and don't want to put their hair up. Bottom line is- you don't know and again- IT DOESN'T AFFECT YOU.

5. DON'T JUDGE PEOPLE FOR WHAT THEY'RE WEARING
So sorry, don't have a trust fund, can't fucking afford a wardrobe packed with neon lululemon. Also, sorry if you think someone is wearing the "wrong type of top" to be wearing for running, I didn't know the gym had a wardrobe police.

6. DON'T TELL PEOPLE THEY'RE "DOING IT WRONG" IF THEY'RE NOT SWEATING
Sorry that you have out of control sweat glands.. but news flash: not EVERYONE sweats like a hog. This does not mean they aren't feeling it in their muscles or they're not working hard. Also, you have NO idea where they're at in their health journey, and you have NO idea how hard that "easy looking workout" may be for them. Come up with a better metric for measuring "gym success", gym douche.

7. COME JANUARY 1, DON'T LOUDLY PROCLAIM THAT YOU CAN'T WAIT UNTIL MARCH WHEN ALL THESE NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS "FALL OFF THE WAGON"
There's really not enough acceptable profanity to express how much I want to hold these people underwater when I hear this phrase. People are giving fitness an honest to god run during new years? GOOD FOR THEM. But you, gym douche.. you need to let everyone know YOU'VE been there since last summer. You work out 5 mornings a week and will be here in March when some people lose steam. YOU can go jump off a cliff.

8. (not "gym" related, but work out related): STOP CORRELATING WORKING OUT WITH, "BECAUSE, POOL SEASON!" 
News flash: not all women work out to look good in a bikini. I understand that's not the entire reason YOU even work out, so why are we perpetuating that stupid phrase? Want to know the number of times I find myself in a bikini for prolonged periods in the summer? Probably 5. Unless I happen to be at/near some kind of beach vacation. Even then. That was something I found far more common at 22, 23. At 27? Not so much. If you're 27+ and make that a priority? Great! I just don't find myself near water all that often. I work out to feel better, stronger, and oh yeah- because my dad had a major heart attack 6 months ago and the docs said it wasn't diet or exercise, it was his genes. Boom, genetic lottery. (Also, this is a shout out to the people who tell me "you don't even need to work out!" --- I didn't know heart attacks cared about your waistline...#weird).

This post was brought to you by the gym douches: self righteous bitches who lord their health and fitness over you, who act like they own the gym, who bitch about things that DO NOT AFFECT THEM. Am I a perfect gym goer? (WHAT?! You didn't know that I went to the gym about 3-4 times a week? Is it because I don't talk about it EVERY DAY? Weird.) NO. But I do my damndest not to side eye people exhibiting peculiar behavior (of which the bar is VERY high for me, since I am very peculiar) because I sympathize MORE with them, than the gym douche decked out in LuLu. (Obviously I know not everyone in lulu is a gym douche, I'm using it as an exhibit).

When I went to my first Barre Fusion class? I was TERRIFIED. I had SO MUCH anxiety about knowing what to do when I walked in the room, being in the right room, grabbing the right items. I actually got there 25 minutes early, thought I was at the wrong room, asked the help desk, and then THANK GOD set my mat down in the PERFECT spot where the bar was about to be set up so I actually don't think it was super obvious that it was my first class but I was SO scared. I know that sounds idiotic but do you want to know WHY? Because of all the bitches who have ever written a "what not to do at the gym" blog post, like they invented the idea of working out.

JUST STOP.

/end rant.