What's happened since, and a play-by-play.

What has happened since my last post is:

1. I realized I should have been a doctor or a paramedic.

My cute boyfriend really did a number on his head the other day. I heard a loud crack then a thud as Alan hit the kitchen floor, hands on head. At first I thought he was being a trickster because he cries wolf an awful lot. However, when I started seeing blood all over the floor (it was a small puddle, so I'm obviously being dramatic) I went instantly into first-aid mode (which is a complete 180 from any previous medical emergency where my assistance was probably needed and I just ran around and cried instead). It's apparent after I treated Alan's head wound (and cleaned up all kinds of blood without vomiting) that I should have gone to medical school. Guess I really missed my calling.

2. We paid to have a couch delivered to our apartment, then paid to have it delivered back because it wouldn't fit up the stairs. 48 hours with a recliner chair (which did fit up the stairs) was nice. Fighting over who would get to sit in the [only] seat in our living room was not so nice.

3.

 4. I ran 12 miles along the BAA half-marathon course and while doing so confirmed my support of Death with Dignity. Here's a small play by play:

Mile 1: I'm sweating already.

Mile 2: I'm running on a busy road because there are no sidewalks. I contemplate if getting hit by a car (only a small ding, c'mon) would be enough to earn me a purple heart and get me dishonorably discharged from running forever.

Mile 3: I regret not running since two Thursdays ago. Oh wait, I did run 1.67 miles with my sister a week before this run so that's good.

Mile 4: an Arboretum. Sweet. Don't care.

Mile 5: Oh, you're golfing and can't get from one hole to the other without a golf cart? Shut up and give me a ride.

Dear family at Mile 6 who is BBQing on this beautiful day in the park,
       Cease and desist unless you're offering me something fresh off the grill.

Mile 7: I stop three times to ask for directions. The third time I stop in a police station (big mistake). Never. I repeat. Never, approach a group of police officers behind a police station (fully sweaty and breathing obscenely loud) unless you want to be yelled at to back up and possibly have weapons drawn on you. Also, don't take their advice on directions because they'll make up train tracks that don't exist and tell you to cross them and then make a right.

Mile 8: People are moving out of my way further and further ahead of me which indicates that I'm huffing and puffing louder and louder. Nice.

Dear guy carrying a pizza box at mile 9,
       Don't smile at me unless you're going to also offer me a slice.

Dear anyone riding a bike after mile 2 but specifically at mile 10,
       Don't pass me unless you're going to offer me a ride on your handle bars.

Mile 11: Just checking on my form

Mile 12: Almost done! Almost done! I'd skip but I'm already race-walking and that seems to be using all of my available energy at the moment.

What followed mile 12 was a walk up three flights of stairs. I think the people smoking outside who could see me through the staircase windows were genuinely concerned about my state.

Miserable.

Kittens: Inspired by Kittens

This weekend I went home with my cute boyfriend. I brought home two scarfs, two paintings and two 6-packs of beer and in return gained a kitchen table, 17,000 tomatoes from my aunt's garden (along with peppers, an onion, a mini-watermelon and herbs), a new plant, a mop and can opener, a million cat things*, approximately 14 pounds and homemade chocolate chip cookies from my grandma. Not a shabby deal.

I appreciate all these things minus the 14 pounds (unless someone found me a size XXL Llama Love sweater in which case, thank you Grandma for force feeding me extra everything at brunch and thank you Kristen for not one but two cakes and a dozen cookies and thank you Roycroft Inn for providing me with ample choices of gourmet brunch foods and endless plates for me to eat said foods on).


If you couldn't tell, it was a weekend FULL of eating good food and talking about eating good food (then talking about not eating food ever again) and planning on eating good food since my family operates strictly around our dining room table/ anyone's dining room table/ our stomachs (wait... are we the Huang's?). Mostly I was in a food coma from Friday night until just now.

The only thing more abundant than carbs this weekend was laughter. My family really is the best. I'd like to thank them for a wonderful weekend and for still loving Alan even though he got Marsala all over my mom's new (creme) blinds.

*In other news, I now have two kittens.

They are 4 month old brothers who were dumped on someone's doorstep.

WHO DUMPS THIS FACE?

This is the best picture I was able to get of the other kitten since he has ADHD and won't sit still.

Their names are Walter and Winston (aka Dumpster Buddies) and I loved them instantly. What I love most is that they don't ignore me like my cat at home does but what I love least is that they've been in my apartment for 12 hours and have already broken things and ripped leaves off of my new plant and spread wet soil allllllllllllllllllllll over my floor which they then proceeded to knead it into my new (creme) kitchen chair seats. (Maybe anyone with the last name Loeffler shouldn't decorate their home with anything creme?)

Currently these kittens are at home unsupervised.















Oh, dear God.

PS: For your enjoyment. You're welcome.

A note on farmers and the state of affairs.

I spent most of Saturday sweating and walking up and down my new street. I went to a couple co-ops and a farmer's market to pick up some tea, spices, tomatoes and bread, stopped in a few shops and almost bought things I didn't need, then stopped in a store and bought a bread machine. I came home and made chocolate chip cookies with the brown sugar I made from scratch earlier in the day,




ate a spoonful of the best jam on this planet,

then ate a pear and bleu cheese crumble sandwich... my favorite!

It was a good day I'd say.


A note on farmers:

I've determined (although I've determined this a while ago and more-so re-affirmed it) that farmers are the most beautiful people in the world.

 

Oh. Hello.

Some fishermen, too. Actually redheads are the most beautiful people in the world -- at least a majority of them-- which makes farmers the second most beautiful people in the world (what about a redheaded farmer, you ask?? I can't even grasp how beautiful this would be. In case you were unaware, not only do I have an undying love for llamas, I also have an undying love for redheads. Most people can deal with the llama love... not so much the case when it comes to redheads.)

People who play the banjo or fiddle tend to be beautiful, too. Young, old, male, female. Doesn't matter. They're probably beautiful.

Anyway, I saw many farmers, no redheads, one person I suspected played the banjo and plenty of farmer's market and co-op go-ers. I love where I live.

The state of affairs:

-We still don't have cable and internet. I'm coping well. Alan, not so much.

We went to the Yard House in Fenway on Sunday so he could watch the Patriot's game and drink beers with some friends that I'd never met. I was surrounded, in my running shorts and long sleeve shirt with wet hair up and no make-up on, by relatively well dressed sports fans drinking beers.

Mostly I looked like this knife at the bar:

I was fine with this. You can't be impossibly beautiful and perfect all the time, right??

 







I ordered a hot tea with honey (who drinks hot tea at a bar???), seven glasses of water and the best buttery four-cheese grilled cheese with bacon and avocado paired with tomato bisque I've ever had. I followed this game with an 11 mile run, shut up.

-We still don't have a kitchen table or a sofa or any apparatus for seating in the entire apartment. We also only have one square inch of counter space. This makes the preparation of any meal or bowl of cereal quite interesting.

-The shower drips, the pilot light on our stove keeps going out, and there is still a hole in my wall.

So that's that.

Llama Love sweater update.

I just wanted to provide a quick update on my quest to find a size small* Llama Love sweater from Madewell:


I "chatted" (is "chatted" even a word???) this morning with Claudia, a Madewell representative, and begged via internet for her to tell me that there was a Llama Love sweater balled up in a back storeroom somewhere for me to purchase. She was so perky in telling me that Madewell was sold out of this very popular item (salt, Claudia, salt in my wound) and that they weren't going to be bringing them back.

She was probably wearing a size small Llama Love sweater as she typed that.

Claudia then proceeded to ask if I'd seen the new sheep sweater that Madewell had "because [she] really [thought I'd] fall just as in love with it" (pfff...) to which I replied "no, sorry, I'm not that into sheep".....

Who says that?

Anyway, this is the sweater she was referring to:



I'm sorry, Claudia from Madewell, but are you offering me this fugly sheep sweater as some sort of consolation for the fact that the llama sweater I've been lusting over for nearly a year is apparently 100% unattainable by any measure???









Shut up, Claudia from Madewell.


*Please note: if I found an extra small sweater, I wouldn't hesitate to starve myself for three days until I fit in it (since you don't alter Llama Love to fit you, you alter yourself to fit Llama Love) and if I found an extra large, I would -- very gladly-- eat everything in sight until it fit.

Moving and llama sweaters

1. Moving is for the birds. It's tiring, I yelled a lot, and it gave me pimples.

On the positive side, I donated several pieces of my never worn gently used clothing (which at one time I'm guessing I just had to have), cleaned out my inventory of things and stuff and precious junk and clay pots and antiques and old wood stuff, got ice cream twice and now have the cutest apartment ever in the history of apartments. I'll add pictures once it's actually as cute as I've just said it is.

2. This new apartment is right across the street from a "huge" ("huge" meaning it's still inside a city) park which is perfect for running in during the day and awful for running in at night. Take, for example, my 10 mile run on Monday night. If you're my mom, please stop reading this now.

Despite being in the middle of a city, it's completely and totally 100% black once the sun goes down. This is great if you're a bat or an opossum, but if you're neither, then it's the worst. Add to this the fact that Florence and the Machine is blaring in my ears, and it would appear that I've placed myself in the perfect setting for an episode of Are You Afraid of the Dark? or CSI: Boston. It's completely unsafe.

I say this partially because of the potential for being kidnapped (though seriously, if you saw how much I sweat during a run and how loudly I huff-n-puff, you'd realize that I'm actually in no danger of being kidnapped) and mostly because at mile 9.4ish I tripped while trying to cross over a bridge and then ran directly into a large size boulder-- shins first. Miserable.

So anyway, now I have to change my running routine and run earlier which generally isn't a problem except for the fact that it ruins basically everything else in my life-- mainly eating and doing nothing.

3. I've decided that hanging shower curtains is similar to torture. While mid-hang, I considered going completely minimalist by not hanging the curtain at all. I thought about it and then realized that a minimalist wouldn't even have a shower curtain in the first place and that I'd have to throw it out. Then I felt terrible about the thought of wasting a brand new shower curtain and considered putting it in my closet along with all my other things and stuff and precious junk and clay pots and antiques and old wood stuff. Then I finished hanging my shower curtain.

4. We have no cable until Friday. I'll be really upset if I miss Betty White present the President at Thursday's Democratic National Convention.

5. Whole Foods is .3 miles from my apartment. This is wonderful news. I've been there literally every single day since I moved (which is really dramatic because it's only been three days). I intend to spend my entire paycheck on organic kale chips (ew) and sea beans (what?) and I don't even like kale chips or know what sea beans are.

6. My wall used to look like this:

And now it looks like this:

You can ask my cute boyfriend about that one.


7. What is getting ridiculous is the fact that I can not find this sweater from Madewell anywhere:


How is it that it's not for purchase anywhere on the whole world wide web? I find this insulting and hard to believe.

I'm considering contacting Madewell and pleading for them to make one just for me and then yelling when they say that they can't do that. What I need to know is what ever happened to good customer service?