View of one of the many decorations in Chinatown

Work sent me to Singapore for a week – it was an amazing trip.  Even though there was work involved, the people we met with were a pleasure to work with and the project manager and I were able to go out wandering after work.  Two of the nights, I found myself in Chinatown (well, the Singapore version of it). 

There were many dragons to be found

They were gearing up for the Chinese New Year and I wanted to share some photographs. 

I had taken up exercising – running to be precise.  Even competed in a 5k fun run and an obstacle course/mud run.  It was after the mud run that I ended up at a surgeons office getting an abscess taken care of.  And they noticed a strange mole on my arm which lead to seeing a dermatologist that sent that in for testing.

That came back positive for melanoma.  Scratch that – at first it came back as another doctor calling to say it was pre-cancerous and I just had to come in for another wider shaving – only to find out after the original doctor was back in the office that it was not precancerous, but cancerous and that I needed to see the surgeon again but I had a trip down to the main office of my company to take care of first.

That was in the beginning of December and I went for a lunch run in 80 degree, sunny, glorious weather only to have someone open the locker over my head while I was putting my shoes on and I stood up – quicky – and sat down quickly holding my head and trying not to swear when my manager (who happened to be in the locker room as well – thank god!) quietly said “Oh no. You’re bleeding”

So I opened my eyes and sure enough – I was bleeding.  A lot.  It was running down my arms and when I tried to keep it from running all over my shirt and pants I succeeded in getting it to run all over my face.  I felt like I was in a Stephen King movie or something.

One lady came in – looked at me and asked “Are you all right?”  Part of me wanted to say “What do you think?” in a snide voice – the other part of me wanted to say “Oh I’m fine!’ in a pleasant voice.  I ended up saying “I’m not sure.  Can I get back to you on that later?”   Obviously I’m passive aggressive when it comes to head injuries.

So bad luck comes in threes:  Abscess, Head Injury, Surgery. 

Then after the holiday i was in Singapore for a week for work.  I’m exhausted.  It’s in the middle of the night here in the frozen tundra of Wisconsin and I’m wide awake, thinking it’s lunchtime.

Sorry for the less than stellar puncuation, spelling and grammar.  I’m off to take some melatonin and see if I can get my sleep cycle back in synch.

tootles

Another plus side?  My pores are looking smaller.  So I am going to be doing this honey mask/wash for a long time.  It’s so easy!!  This morning I even slapped some on my neck because I wanted my skin to feel as yummy as my face (and speaking of yummy – how many things to you put on your face that don’t taste like gack if you accidentally get it in your mouth whilst rinsing?)

Tomorrow I am going to Festa Italiana with my youngest – hopefully this better weather will hold out and it won’t be too bad – it’s either that or I’m going to have to break out the razor and shave my legs!!

Give the honey a try though – give it a couple of days and I’m sure you’ll be impressed!  Oh and I should add that I have super sensitive skin

My friend Aimee posted a cryptic message on her blog that sent me over to the Crunchy Betty site about the honey challenge. 

Basically – you wash your face (without makeup) for two weeks.  She has a cute video on her blog that I suggest you watch.  Not that anyone needs to know how to wash her face it’s just done in such “Leave it to Beaver” fashion that it made me grin.

On a side note, I’ve been washing my face twice a day with honey.  I leave it on for a bit (which is easy because some of my honey is kinda thick) to soak it the goodness.  My skin looks different and feels a bit different.    The texture of my skin is smoother and feels a bit firmer.  One of the things I regularly had an issue with is my skin feeling dry after washing it.  So much so that I usually ended up just rinsing with water because when my skin is dry – my body compensates by making my face oily.

Ugh.

Work has been keeping me very busy.  And while I don’t mind being busy, I don’t like feeling overwhelmed and that’s pretty much where I’m at now.  I don’t mind occasional moments of stress but when it becomes the norm, I tend to focus on what I didn’t accomplish rather than the things I did get done (which is easy to do when your list seems to get longer and longer).

Enough whining for me.  I am going to go slather some honey on my face and appreciate the central air conditioning in this hot and humid night!

Namaste \o/

For a number of years I’ve been lamenting my shape (mostly round) and my health (mostly .. soso).  About a year ago I started eating better (and by better I mean less preservatives) and from there I gradually made the switch to a raw diet.   I am not 100% raw – some days I am 100%, some days I’m 80% – an average non-holiday week I’d say I’m about 95%.

Eating raw is actually kind of easy – for me at least because most of the recipes are easy peasy and oooohhhh so tasty.  But then there are recipes that are tasty and take bit of time.

Lately, my favorite food has been nori rolls – made with a lovely ginger-cashew pate (recipe found at Choosing Raw )  This pate is sooooo DELISH.  I have it about once a week with some sliced cucumbers, shredded carrots, thinly shaved onions and either homegrown alfalfa sprouts or locally grown watercress.

Nori Rolls with Ginger-Cashew Pate from Choosing Raw

I hope the picture shows up right, technology is not cooperating with me today.  Probably because I’ve been too busy in the kitchen or out riding my bike – perhaps my computer is feeling left out.  Oy.. what a thought – a computer with feelings. 

Derailing that thought.   I’m off to write some late responses to some very sweet folks – I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and I will try and not stay away for so long.

And I suggest giving that Ginger-Cashew Pate a try – it is sooo totally worth it!

xoxo

I have two big things planned for April.  The first is Go Fresh!  It’s an eleven week initiative run by Penni Shelton over at Raw Food Rehab.  Clicky the link if you’re interested in what that’s all about.

Secondly, my friend Shanna (lovely Shanna) has started or rather, picked up a ball that was dropped last year and is doing a poem-a-day thing over HERE. (again, click the link – I promise it’s safe for work…if your work allows you to visit blogs).

If I can figure out how to single space the poem, I’ll post them here.  Eh. I’ll post the poems here either way.  As for the Go Fresh initiative, while I am doing weekly weigh-ins there, I’m not sure if I’m going to share it here (well I’m sure I will but perhaps not weekly because I’m lazy).

I hope all is well with you and that the weather by you is a lot warmer than it is here in SE Wisconsin!

But it could be worse… I’m sure

xoxo

My hands are a mess but it’s well worth it (that and I have discovered the wonders of coconut oil – thanks Aimee

Currently, I’m coming off of a 10 dayjuice  fast (I did the 10-day juice fast by Natasha St. Michael that you can read about here) and I am going to be participating in the Go Fresh initiative that Penni Shelton is running that starts on April 1st.

The juice fast was great.  Seriously.  It was.  There were days when I swore that I would not be able to go another day or minute or hour, but I did.  I did the full 10 days and I am looking forward to doing another  one in the near future.  And by near future, I mean on or around April 1st – though I believe I’d like to try a full 2 week juice fast.

Oh and I had lost around 9 lbs from the juice fast so – that’s nothing to sneeze at. 

Now if I can just ignore the cheese in the fridge!

x0x0

I don’t follow many recipes because I live in Wisconsin and during the winter the produce starts looking pretty weak.    But it’s getting better – I just picked up some organic kale last night.

This morning – don’t ask me why – but I decided to put some raisins in my smoothie.  It seemed fine at first – I put it in the mason jar and took it to work only to discover a few hours later that my banana, blueberry, pineapple, raisin and spinach smoothie was more like sludge.

It tastes good but not the best looking smoothie I’ve made.

At least now I know

xoxo

I work for a giant corporation and our building is one of the main centers. There are about 3,000 of us milling around during the day.  Our building is set up with some rather nice break rooms where there are microwaves, refrigerators, an ice/water dispenser and the coffee pots.

There is one gentleman that comes in and makes a HUGE mess.  And by HUGE I mean I have witnessed him splash coffee all over the counter and not wipe it up.  He has made coffee using two packets instead of the one (clogging up the filter and causing a tar like ground coffee mess.  I’ve watched him to this double packet thing and restart the coffee while the pot was still half full (that time I didn’t exactly control my anger and to his credit he said he’d clean it up – probably to shut me up).

People have left signs for this jackwad about cleaning up – only using one packet of coffee, etc.  Either he doesn’t read (or can’t), he doesn’t pay attention or he doesn’t give a damn.  I’m personally thinking that it’s a mix of all three.

Needless to say after a couple years of this – I tend to scowl a bit when I see him zipping down the hallway on his way to or from the break room (my theory is that he knows he’s pissed off most of the people here so he moves fast to not be followed to his cube and to make the target area harder to hit in case someone gets to the point of throwing  something at him).

So yesterday when I came around the corner and saw him, I thought to myself “He’s not worth the effort to be pissed at” and  as I agreed with myself  I watched  in shock as one of his suspenders suddenly let go of his pants and smacked him in the side of the face.  The hilarity continued as he squeaked and jumped around holding the side of his face.

Thankfully, my parents taught me manners and I moved away and was well (mostly) out of earshot before I chuckled out loud.  By the time I got to my desk I was laughing.

Not a bad day all in all

But I wonder what would happen if I gave up on being pissed about the folks that talk too loud in the next aisle?!?!?!

Peace!

My hair is short. I like it short. It’s easy to take care of after my days of perms and color.  Of blow-drying my hair straight only to put it in hot rollers and attack it with a curling iron.  Not to mention the mousse, hairspray and other products that I used in an effort to have the perfect coif.

I have fine, straight hair and without the products and perms it doesn’t do much except lay on my head all limp like.  However, cut short and it stands up and looks like I have an amazing head of hair.  Every new beautician I’ve had has said the same thing when I stagger in  – asking to get it cut.

Well I had my last haircut before Thanksgiving and for some reason I decided to let it grow out.  Then for a week or three, I thought I might just try and grow it out again. That was until my “bangs’ starting annoying the crap out of me.

So I dragged out the hair clips in an attempt (at least while at home) to keep the hair from driving me fully bonkers.  But alas, my finely straight hair is masterful at escaping any clip or barrette known to man.

This past Friday – I was actually thinking that I would be attempting to cut my own hair with a set of dull kitchen scissors -that’s how desperate I was.  Instead I stopped by a local  haircut joint to have them take care of this debacle.

The lady I usually went to wasn’t there – and the place was busy and I though “eh, I should go home”  but I knew I was going on a bit of a road trip the next day and didn’t want to deal with it.  So I waited.

The person I got seemed nice – though a bit heavy on the word “definitely”  and I explained how I wanted my hair.  Her first pass, it was still too long on top and I had her take it down a bit.  Since my hair is fine – I tend to close my eyes while it’s being cut – only looking when asked to.

When I looked again – it seemed fine.  She had put pomade in and I thanked her – paid the bill and gave her a tip and went home, happy that my hair was out of my eyes.

Then later that night my hair felt a bit icky and I scratched my head only to realize that this woman had GOBBED my hair with styling paste.  So I hopped into the shower (never a bad thing to do after a haircut) and when I got out – I realized that this woman had failed to cut most of the hair on the left side of my head after her first initial hacking pass.

Seriously – my hair was awful.  But There was nothing I could do.  So the next morning I tried my best to make it look even.  Though I got the strange looks from our tax lady and my cousin and her kids.  Because I was driving my husband didn’t notice how crappy my haircut was until he walked in with me and stood on my left.

As I was explaining to the other lady (thank goodness the one who did this to me wasn’t there) my husband turned and looked and said “Holy cow, is your hair hacked up over here. It looks like Gabe* cut your hair and Sarah** tried to fix it by helping Gabe”  which prompted me to be taken back IMMEDIATELY.

Well when my hair was looked at even the new lady was shocked – she apologized and said she’d have to cut my hair even shorter to make everything match up.

After a lot of cutting my hair looks fabulous and I’m a happy camper.  And I could have taken a picture but I forgot and it’s Monday so it’s probably not going to happen.  But the universe is a much happier place now that my hair isn’t all jacked up (some bits were around 4″ long on one side and like 1/2″ on the opposite side of my head!)

Lesson learned: Make sure to check your entire head BEFORE they put the goo on it.

Happy Valentines Day!

*Gabe is my 5 year old grandson

** Sarah is my daughter and Gabe’s mom