Hello Again!

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After resolving to keep up with this blog regularly at the beginning of this year, I unexpectedly went through a frightening health issue on January 31st that left me with some scary and confusing residual symptoms, the main symptom being vertigo. I call it confusing because I've been to 8 doctors so far this year and tons of testing but at this point I have no answers as to what the cause may be. The frustrating thing with vertigo is that it is a condition diagnosed by elimination. Luckily there are hundreds of possibilities and not thousands, so I have hope that someday I'll figure out the root cause and get the proper help to eliminate the symptoms forever. Just thinking about that gives me joy.

THANK GOD for hope.

Resolution: Tranquility

I came across an art gallery of Peter Lik's photography while on a mini vacation with DH last year. I was literally drawn into the gallery by his amazing work and I found myself parked in front of a particular piece, getting lost in the lovely details. Unfortunately priced at $92K, my favorite photo won't be displayed in my home anytime in the near future (or probably ever), so as a consolation prize, I took a picture of it with my little iPhone. The clear blue waters blending with the equally clear blue sky just ooze serenity and relaxation, and really helps me shake off some stress when I'm feeling overwhelmed. This year, I resolve look at the big picture (and this picture), learn to relax, and know when to unload. I wish I was laying out on that strip of sandy beach under the luscious, green mountain after a soak in the sparkling waters while doing all the de-stressing, but this will have to do for now.

Isn't this just a breath of fresh air?

Peter Lik's "Tranquil Bay"

Resolution: Willpower

I've found that I have absolutely no willpower as I get older, so I made a few "soft" resolutions for 2013 which, in my definition, are resolutions that I will strive to keep but will not beat myself up over if I fail to keep them. One of my "soft" resolutions this year was to cut out unnecessary sugar intake. Not too big of a challenge because I'm not really a sweets-loving kind of girl. I could live without ice cream, brownies, cupcakes, donuts...you get the picture. So after an unusual streak of polishing off mint-n-chip ice cream with DH almost every week in December, I resolved to stay away from sugary snacks. So what did I do? Less than a week after the new year started, I ate this beauty:

A delicious Sprinkles cupcake. My excuse? I'd never tried a peanut butter flavored cupcake before and therefore couldn't pass up the offer to try one. FAIL. It was so good and it'll be difficult, but I would eat it again in a heartbeat will try harder to stick to resist sugary temptation this year.

True Hotness

I love everything spicy. Steak, salad, pasta, sandwiches...in my opinion, anything and everything is better with some extra hotness. My love for hot sauce started years ago with Tabasco, then moved over to Tapatio, then I almost gave up on hot sauce altogether when I was disappointed by a variety of them all promising to be "the spiciest hot sauce on earth," until I was introduced to

Happy New Year!

I already feel excited for this December as I clean and put away remnants of a holiday spent with loved ones. I did make a teeny tiny effort to eat healthier for Christmas this year by serving serving Greek yogurt desserts.

DH and I loved it but for my snack-loving family, it was followed by flamin' hot Cheetos, mint ice cream, pita crackers with Vermont cheddar cheese, and banana chips. But I suppose we have the rest of the year to burn off our holiday calories.

Cheers to a healthy and fruitful 2013!

First Run of the Year

This blog was created a little less than one year ago to keep me accountable to the world, so how have I done this year? Not great at all. Not even a little bit good. No pats on the back for me this year. I won't lie, it involved a big dose of laziness, also evidenced by my lack of ability to keep up this online diary. I didn't start a blog to make revenue (although if it ever happened I wouldn't mind one bit) or compete with other blogs (so many good ones out there!), I wanted to express myself in a somewhat public forum and hopefully meet interesting people going through similar life circumstances along the way. That said, after a year of putting things off, I finally bit the bullet and went running with my DH today (he has diligently run almost every morning this past month and I've joined him 0 times). And my first thought after agreeing to go (and delaying his run by almost 2 hours) was what should I wear? So here's my outfit for my first real workout of the year.

Glad Solved My Dressing Woes

I love packing salad for lunch - quick, easy, light, healthy and yummy - but I always run into problems with the dressing. Mini tupperware containers made for dressings seem to leak no matter what. Packing the mini tupperware in a ziploc bag helps but then I have to deal with a messy wet bag and a drippy dressing container. So I started taking the entire bottle of dressing, but leaving food in my office fridge is, well, let's just say not the best option, and taking it back and forth was tedious. This was my ongoing small but annoying battle with salad dressing until I saw one of my coworkers whip out this wonderful invention for lunch one day.