Gah!

I have been thinking a lot lately about the discrepancy between who I am and who I want to be. But to change requires that I be aware of what I want to be at critical times when I am distracted by other motives. Hm. How to resolve?
Things at work are kind of hectic lately. A voluntary lay-off is going on, and depending on what happens with the FY2011 budget, there could be an involunary lay-off to follow. I am trying to remain faithful, and have been praying for good things to happen. I've been so blessed to have my job, and I don't want to lose it. I've just been trying to be prayerful and patient, and I'm trying to work hard and be productive. Because of all the time and effort I've been putting into work, I've totally slacked on my diet. I just feel like there are only so many things I can focus on at any given time. I'm trying to stick with some small positive changes that I've made, and with lent coming up soon, I should have some new motivation. I think this year I might give up fried food. That means no more fries, no more chips and salsa, no more Sunday donuts. It would be good for me. Mmmm, speaking of chips and salsa, Charles and I have found a new Mexican restaurant in town that we enjoy. Mexico Lindo is on Cedar Bluff. Last night we had their dinner special. It's a "pick two" dinner.... you get to choose 2 items from a list (taco, enchilada, burrito, tamale....), and 2 sides (rice, beans, or mashed potatoes). You get 2 dinners, 2 drinks, and one dessert (ice cream with sopapilla!) for $12.99. It is delicious, and a fantastic deal. I recommend the enchilada. Also, chicken entrees do not have onions and peppers mixed in with the chicken. I like onions and peppers, personally, but Charles does not, so he was very happy with the chicken item that he had.
Lastly, I want to recommend a series of books. They are the Haggis-On-Whey books.... fake sciencey kids' books written by Benny Haggis-On-Whey and Dr. Doris Haggis-On-Whey. They are totally silly! You should check them out if you like silly books. :)
OK, back to the grindstone....

I'm so behind!

As usual, things have been crazy and hectic. I've been working a lot-- having some extra projects to do at work has been fantastic. I tend to work much more efficiently when I have a lot to do, and I've been meeting people, too! My job is where I've been focusing the majority of my energy lately, so I've put all weight loss efforts on hold with the exception of continuing to attend my bi-weekly karate class. I've also been trying to implement some healthy choices by changing one habit at a time and keeping it for a month before adding a new one. It's been helping me to keep a little focus, while preventing me from getting overwhelmed.
Lots have been going on. My hubby has been administering IQ tests as practice for his School Psych degree. He gave a great test this morning to one of the greatest 13 year olds I know. It's been a lot of fun helping him practice and talking to him about pros and cons of different types of tests.
This weekend I got to see Anya and meet a bunch of her friends, and have what was probably the greatest cupcake I've ever had in my entire life. She sent 2 home with me, too, so I'm going to go eat my other one and let the hubs have his in just a moment. I'm hoping Anya will blog about it so I can just link everyone to what I dubbed the Anya Bomb. :)
Here in an hour or 2 I'll be going to a friend's place, probably to watch the Packers lose the Super Bowl. :( Gosh, I hope not. This is really only my 2nd year watchin NFL, so my feelings aren't very strong just yet, but I have serious favorings for the Packers over the Steelers and would like to see the Packers win. I like their small town, Americana attitude. So GO PACK GO and all that jazz.
There was so much that I wanted to write about, but I'm kind of getting distracted at the moment by a very fussy dog, so I think I'm just going to wrap this up and start preparing for the Super Bowl. If you read this, I hope you're having a great weekend! :)

Little Joe's Pizza

For years, I have been aware of Little Joe's presence, but only recently did I decide that I wanted to try the food there. I think I had some of their food once for a Latin party in high school, but I'd never been to the restaurant. Well, let me tell you, getting there was no easy task. Why? Because they have ridiculous hours. On Fridays and Saturdays, when I would normally go for lunch, they don't open until 2:00pm. And they are closed on Sundays, which is my other prime time for trying new restaurants. But thanks to my friends, I was finally able to try it last night, and man oh man was it good!! I can't wait to go back. Hubby and I shared a small pizza- half cheese, half sausage. The small is 11 inches, but it was enough for me and the Hubs. We even had a few slices left to share with our friend, David. Hubby had a soda while I had water, and our total bill before tip was under $12. Not too shabby. What I'm really interested in, though, is the amazing sandwich that Sharon ordered. Apparently it's only available during the holiday season. It's a hot roast beef sandwich served with Au Jus. She got it with cheese and onions and green peppers. It looked and smelled amazing. I have to get back there this holiday season one way or another!
I definitely recommend Little Joe's pizza if you ever feel like going deep into Farragut any night except Sunday. :D

Christmas!

Christmas was marvelous. A 4-day weekend, snow, family, friends, Christmas, a great mass made for a really great Christmas this year. Definitely way better than last year. Last year had some really good moments, but I was just so stressed out that I couldn't really enjoy things fully. But this year... this year was something wonderful. :) I really enjoyed getting to visit with my friend, Lara. I don't get to see her much since she and her husband live in Chicago. It was enriching to hang out with her and talk about religion. I definitely felt fortified after we talked, cause sometimes I feel like the lonely Christian in my circle of friends. What a blessing to visit with Lara and Brad.
Mass this year was wonderful. I usually go to a 4:00 pm service on Christmas Eve to see the children in their nativity attire. It's been so crowded the last couple years that I changed it up a little this time around, and went to a 4:10 'overflow' mass. Father Michael gave a really excellent homily (one point I really liked was where he said that having Jesus in your life doesn't mean that everything is going to be OK, but that whether things are OK or not, you have Jesus with you always.... so cool!), and there was a lot of great singing. We sang many of my favorite Christmas songs, including O Holy Night and Joy to the World.
Christmas Day I got to visit with Dad and Rebecca, talk to Sarah, open presents with Charles, see his mother's side of the family, and chill out at home. It was just super to be able to rest. And the day after Christmas, we went to Home Depot and took advantage of the after-Christmas sale. We bought a 7.5' Christmas tree, some colored lights, and some ornaments. Now I'm all ready to go for next year!
Looking forward to seeing more folks this week. Life is good. :) :)

I ♥ Christmas!

It's that time of year again: the time when I leave my radio on B97.5 almost all the time. I frickin' love Christmas. I love the whole Jesus miracle story, and thinking about how safe we are, and I love Christmas treats and decorations, and shopping for my hubby. I love being out in the hustle and bustle (for about 20 minutes, and then I see people that leave shopping carts in parking spaces, and then the joy is gone for the day....). I think last year I was a little stressed about trying to find a real job, and I was worried about my work at SNS, and I was working a LOT, and trying to get settled into our new home. This year, I am blessed with a job that I adore, and I can just take it easy and enjoy spending time with my family and friends.
Tomorrow is a Holy Day, too, so I've got to remember to go to mass! Though I think with my work schedule, I'll be forced to go at kind of an odd time. But oh well. Hopefully there will be Christmas music at church. WOO HOO! :) OK, sorry for the outburst, I just adore this time of year. :) :) :)

Art Break

My coworker, Jim, was telling me about a certain Doctor Who character that he likes, but she's from the Matt Smith era, and I haven't gotten to that part yet. So I google-imaged her, and found that yes, Amy Pond is really pretty! But then I saw that someone took things a step further and drew Amy Pond in an Mucha/art nouveau style. I ♥ Art Nouveau. So I just had to share.

An Analogy

In church yesterday, the deacon had an interesting analogy. I'll try to recreate it here as best I can.

Imagine you really want to watch the Vols play, but you have to miss the game, so you record it to watch it later. Before you get a chance to watch it, someone says, "How bout that game? Isn't it amazing that Vols won!?" You might feel somewhat frustrated that you know the ending, but you go home to watch the replay anyways. The Vols throw and interception and get scored on in the first play. A few minutes later, the Vols fumble and the other team scores again. How do you feel? When you know the outcome of the game is positive, these screw-ups don't mean as much to you. You don't have to watch the game in an anxious state, because you know how things will turn out. Instead, you can watch with joy. Isn't this how our Christian life should be? We know the outcome. We know God has great things in store for us, and we know that in the end, God 'wins' and we are safe. So we should live our lives with the expectant joy of someone that knows the outcome, even if there are fumbles along the way.

I thought it was a really nice analogy, and it invokes an attitude that I'd like to try to adopt. I worry way too much. I have a fantastic life, but I always worry that I am going to lose the things that make me happy. But no one can take the Number One things from me, so I really should not stress out so much!

Anyhow, on another topic, I had a great day yesterday going to a 5K with Anya. I wasn't able to run the whole thing; I just hadn't trained enough, but I knew that going in. I am proud to say that I ran more than the first mile, and then I walked and jogged the rest. I would estimate that I ran a total of 2.5 miles and walked the rest, but I can't confirm that. I really liked that Anya and I had a plan: we would start together, and we'd meet up at the end and have dinner. But she didn't have to stay with me the whole time, so she could run the whole race and I could walk as needed. It was a great race day and I was glad to get to participate. I hope that next time I can run the whole race! :) My finishing time was meh, but I'll note here that it was 39:52 so that hopefully I can look back on this in the future and see my improvement. Oh yeah, and dinner at Savelli's afterwards was SO GOOD. I will definitely want to go back there sometime and would recommend it to others. :)