I made delicious dinner tonight that reminded me why I like being vegan. This is what it was:
1 c Quinoa
a few garlic cloves
an onion
1 package of tempeh
1 red pepper
1 tomato
a whole lot of kale
1 can of kidney beans
oregano, basil, garlic salt, pepper and lemon juice.
I sauteed the onions and garlic in olive oil, added the tempeh and pepper and then sprinkled the spices and lemon juice over everything. I just poured a lot of lemon juice. In my opinion you can't have too much. Then I put the kale in and gave it time to cook down. Then I poured the can of kidney beans in with all the liquid from the can, added the tomato and I put the spices on again and more lemon juice. I let it simmer for awhile in all of the juices. I cooked the quinoa in the rice cooker. And then Ryan and I ate it while watching the office on netflix. It was so good! One of the reasons I became vegan was to eat more vegetables. Lately I have been been doing pretty good at that. Ryan and I have been doing a lot of home cooking with tons of veggies.
Nursing school has been going really well so far. I keep waiting for it to get nuts, but right now it seems really doable. My schedule is pretty awesome. Mondays and Tuesday and Thursdays are pretty packed but I have Wednesdays off and Friday mornings off. Usually I watch law and order on those days and try to do work. I probably should be doing more reading for school.
I have been trying to keep up with all the news about Occupy Wall st and Occupy Philly. I went to one of the Wall St marches. I feel pretty disconnected from the Wall St stuff. Probably because I am new to NYC and don't know a lot of people. I feel a lot more connected to the Philly stuff, but I am so far away from it. I feel pretty disconnected from street activism these days. I just don't feel the passion like I used to. I think my brain might be too critical. I feel really happy that all of this this stuff is happening. I'm just having a hard time relating to the "if you aren't documenting it, it didn't happen" actions.
Since moving to New York, I have watched all of Mad Men. I have also become addicted to Scrabble and Words with Friends on my iphone. I've been watching a lot of baseball lately. I felt real sad when the Phillies lost in the playoffs. I miss Philly, but I am glad to have a quiet calm life in Brooklyn. It is pretty here and the people watching is top notch.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
It is a rainy day in Brooklyn. Ryan started his job at the high school this week while I have been trying to keep busy getting things in order before school starts. Yesterday I went to the Fairway supermarket in Red Hook with Molly. I bought many household staples that will hopefully hold us over for a few weeks. Today I was supposed to do laundry, but I cleaned the kitchen and made an excellent bagel sandwich instead. I started cleaning the bedroom, but I think I drank too much coffee and took too many vitamins because I started feeling nauseous and had to sit down for awhile. I have been obsessed with cleaning and organizing since moving into the new apartment. I love our apartment. It is bright and newly refinished. It has a huge bedroom and living room, hardwood floors, white walls, and arched doorway. It is the nicest place I have ever lived. I just finished reading a book called "Dirty Secret" by Jessie Scholl. It is about being the daughter of a compulsive hoarder. I also grew up in a hoarding household and am continually learning how that is affecting me in my adult life. I never learned to clean or organize or get rid of things. A few years ago I got a job as a house cleaner partially so I could learn how to clean properly. I am pretty good at cleaning now, but organizing stuff and getting rid of stuff has been a major hurdle for me. This move has been really nice because Ryan and I had a few weeks to unpack and organize. We made several trips to box stores and the hardware store. Ryan spent days building a wall sized shelving unit so we can store our library of books and records. It is amazing to have a living space that I feel proud of. This is the first time I have felt that. It is a huge thing for me. I am scared that once school starts I won't have time to keep up with maintaining an organized work and living space. But I am hopeful. Brooklyn has been a nice change from Philadelphia. I haven't really had any obligations since being here and that has helped clear my mind. I have hung out with a few friends and gone exploring some but it feels really different than Philly. Things are new. I've been making an effort to wear new outfits (the same old clothes, but in a different way).
I've been really nervous about starting school. It starts Sept 19th. I've been having anxiety dreams about going to the hospital. My first day is at the hospital! I have to be there at 7:30 am. I have a little more that 1 week left of summer vacation.
Ryan and I have become addicted to Mad Men. I want to watch it all the time. I dream about it sometimes. We have also become addicted to Klein's vegan ice cream. They sell it at the kosher supermarket 2 blocks away. It is the best vegan ice cream ever. Normally I don't eat sweets very often. I like salty snacks so much more, but this ice cream has been all I want everyday. The kosher supermarket also sells the best vegan whipped cream ever.
I bought Dodger an orthopedic dog bed and he loves it. He sleeps on it all the time. It is very cute. TK likes the new apartment. She found a special sleeping spot underneath some clothes that hang in the bedroom. She keeps clawing the new couch and it is making me crazy. I may try to get her some of those covers for her nails, since nothing else has been working.
I've been really nervous about starting school. It starts Sept 19th. I've been having anxiety dreams about going to the hospital. My first day is at the hospital! I have to be there at 7:30 am. I have a little more that 1 week left of summer vacation.
Ryan and I have become addicted to Mad Men. I want to watch it all the time. I dream about it sometimes. We have also become addicted to Klein's vegan ice cream. They sell it at the kosher supermarket 2 blocks away. It is the best vegan ice cream ever. Normally I don't eat sweets very often. I like salty snacks so much more, but this ice cream has been all I want everyday. The kosher supermarket also sells the best vegan whipped cream ever.
I bought Dodger an orthopedic dog bed and he loves it. He sleeps on it all the time. It is very cute. TK likes the new apartment. She found a special sleeping spot underneath some clothes that hang in the bedroom. She keeps clawing the new couch and it is making me crazy. I may try to get her some of those covers for her nails, since nothing else has been working.
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Things are hard right now. Moving is very stressful and seems like it is never ending. I don't really want to talk about it, but that is all anyone asks me about. I've been pretty bummed out this week so I am going to try to focus on some things that have been keeping me sane.
Seeing friends when I can.-- I just had a 20 minute lunch with my friend Elliot and it was fun and nice to get away from my desk at work.
Ryan sending me picture texts of the new apartment. He moved stuff to Brooklyn yesterday and texted me with pictures of the apartment. I kept looking at the pictures daydreaming about the new apartment.
Capogiro Sorbet-- I feel so stupid that I have lived in Philly for so long, but I haven't gone here that much. The fruit sorbet is creamy and delicious. Way better than I ever expected.
Having a sidewalk sale -- There have been a few boxes that I have been moving forever. Getting rid of stuff is emotionally weird for me, but the process feels really healthy. It was nice to make a few bucks for stuff I hadn't really looked at in forever.
Dodger and Titty Kitty. I like it when Dodger sleeps with me and when he is wide awake first thing in the morning. Seing Dodger excited for the day makes me more excited for the day.
Seeing friends when I can.-- I just had a 20 minute lunch with my friend Elliot and it was fun and nice to get away from my desk at work.
Ryan sending me picture texts of the new apartment. He moved stuff to Brooklyn yesterday and texted me with pictures of the apartment. I kept looking at the pictures daydreaming about the new apartment.
Capogiro Sorbet-- I feel so stupid that I have lived in Philly for so long, but I haven't gone here that much. The fruit sorbet is creamy and delicious. Way better than I ever expected.
Having a sidewalk sale -- There have been a few boxes that I have been moving forever. Getting rid of stuff is emotionally weird for me, but the process feels really healthy. It was nice to make a few bucks for stuff I hadn't really looked at in forever.
Dodger and Titty Kitty. I like it when Dodger sleeps with me and when he is wide awake first thing in the morning. Seing Dodger excited for the day makes me more excited for the day.
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Updates!!!!
It is official. I am moving to Crown Heights in August. Ryan and I drove up to NYC on Monday to sign our lease. We will be living in an apartment building on the 6th floor. There is an elevator. We are optimistic about our apartment. We have a big bedroom and living room, bathroom, kitchen and a few closets. There may even be some hallway room for creative bike storage. It feels really nice to have a lease signed. The apartment is affordable and I really liked the neighborhood. It is 5 blocks from Ryan's school. It will probably take me 45 min to an hour to get to NYU. It will be nice for the pets to have Ryan home quickly since I will be having irregular student hours. It looks like all of my classes first semester will start after 10AM and some of them will be until 7 or 8pm. My clinicals are going to be every other week from 3 until 10pm. This will be so different from my schedule now. I normally get up at 6:30 and work until 3:30 and try to do things until 11 or 12 when I go to bed. Going back to a student schedule will be weird but will probably agree with me since I don't really like seeing 6:30am. I went to NYU last week for orientation. I got to hang out with Molly and Brian. We watched the Bacholerette and tweeted our witty commentary. The Bacholer/Bacholerette is a weird cultural phenomenom. Watching it hurt my brain a little bit.
It was good to spend 3 days in NYC I got to ride the subways on my own and check out apartments. Molly and I walked around and drank coffee and made sandwiches. Ryan came up on Wednesday night to pick me up. The last apartment that we saw was the one that we ended up getting. We looked at 2 before that were a decent size but they felt like the NYC nightmare apartment that you see in movies and tv. One of them was in a building near a really congested interesection next to a subway station. The previous tenants had been evicted so the apartment was a wreck with dirt and garbage everywhere. The subway was above ground and went by the back of the apartment. From the window you could see the train tracks and graffiti. There were cops all over the block and the only parking was meter parking. I had an internal freak out at the idea of living there. Then we saw an apartment a few blocks away that was also in a congested shopping district. and it had a crazy layout and was also a mess. It was nice relief to look at the apartment in Crown Heights. It isn't too far from Prospect Park and there is a grocery store across the street. We looked at a few places in Sunset Park that would be really close to Molly and Brian (in one case it was right downstairs) but the Crown Heights apartment definitely had the right price and accomodations for a dog that cannot do a lot of stairs and was bigger than the other one bedrooms that we looked at. Next on the to do list is have a yard sale in Philly and figure out how to organize all of our personal items into a 3 room apartment. We will have a least a week before Ryan starts school to unpack and organize right. I feel up for the challenge. Since I moved in with Ryan in April we never properly set the house up because we new that moving was in the near future and we still had to paint and finish the floors. I have always lived in a chaotic bedroom and am hoping to for once live in one that is organized and attractive. This is also the first time that I will have full reign over my living space. I'll only have one person to compromise with instead of 3.
Philly life continues to be busy. Ryan is in a band called Must Be Nice with my old housemate Amy and another guy named Russ. They started playing shows on Sunday. We went to Scranton to Amy's parents house for a pool party/show. It was awesome. Sunday was perfect swimming weather. There was tons of food and beverages and we got to see Must Be Nice and a pop punk band from Florida called Larf play. A parent's house felt very appropriate for a first show. They played outside so the sound was a little wonky, no montiors or Lollapalooza stage yet! Ryan has been working on this band since we met in October with Russ and it WAS NICE to see them finally play a show. Yesterday they played in West Philly with Larf again and tonight they are going to play in Sea Isle City NJ. Tonight should be so good. In my opinion Good Luck is the best band that is still playing and NJ rules.
A few months ago, we planted a vegetable garden which has since exploded with tomatoes and other veggies and we have also been getting a CSA share all summer. As of late I have made vegan cole slaw with CSA carrots and cabbage. I'm not sure what else to do with cabbage in the summer. We also have been getting a lot of beets in the CSA. I never bought beets before but I am falling love with them. I have been into making mashed beets and potatoes. This has been so delicious. I just boil the beets and potatoes together and just mash them up with almond milk and earth balance. Everything turns pink so it is beautiful and delicious. Last night we made salad with pasta, green beans, greens, apples, tomatoes, carrots, cukes, and peppers. We just steamed the green beans and threw them in. I have never eaten green beans in salad before and it is awesome. I love the CSA because it forces me to cook with things I don't normally buy like beets, cabbage and green beans. We were also getting scallions for awhile and I became a total fan. I loved the scallions in salad.
My last day of work is August 5th, then I'm going to Michigan for a week, then I am moving to Brooklyn. Holy Crap!!!!
It was good to spend 3 days in NYC I got to ride the subways on my own and check out apartments. Molly and I walked around and drank coffee and made sandwiches. Ryan came up on Wednesday night to pick me up. The last apartment that we saw was the one that we ended up getting. We looked at 2 before that were a decent size but they felt like the NYC nightmare apartment that you see in movies and tv. One of them was in a building near a really congested interesection next to a subway station. The previous tenants had been evicted so the apartment was a wreck with dirt and garbage everywhere. The subway was above ground and went by the back of the apartment. From the window you could see the train tracks and graffiti. There were cops all over the block and the only parking was meter parking. I had an internal freak out at the idea of living there. Then we saw an apartment a few blocks away that was also in a congested shopping district. and it had a crazy layout and was also a mess. It was nice relief to look at the apartment in Crown Heights. It isn't too far from Prospect Park and there is a grocery store across the street. We looked at a few places in Sunset Park that would be really close to Molly and Brian (in one case it was right downstairs) but the Crown Heights apartment definitely had the right price and accomodations for a dog that cannot do a lot of stairs and was bigger than the other one bedrooms that we looked at. Next on the to do list is have a yard sale in Philly and figure out how to organize all of our personal items into a 3 room apartment. We will have a least a week before Ryan starts school to unpack and organize right. I feel up for the challenge. Since I moved in with Ryan in April we never properly set the house up because we new that moving was in the near future and we still had to paint and finish the floors. I have always lived in a chaotic bedroom and am hoping to for once live in one that is organized and attractive. This is also the first time that I will have full reign over my living space. I'll only have one person to compromise with instead of 3.
Philly life continues to be busy. Ryan is in a band called Must Be Nice with my old housemate Amy and another guy named Russ. They started playing shows on Sunday. We went to Scranton to Amy's parents house for a pool party/show. It was awesome. Sunday was perfect swimming weather. There was tons of food and beverages and we got to see Must Be Nice and a pop punk band from Florida called Larf play. A parent's house felt very appropriate for a first show. They played outside so the sound was a little wonky, no montiors or Lollapalooza stage yet! Ryan has been working on this band since we met in October with Russ and it WAS NICE to see them finally play a show. Yesterday they played in West Philly with Larf again and tonight they are going to play in Sea Isle City NJ. Tonight should be so good. In my opinion Good Luck is the best band that is still playing and NJ rules.
A few months ago, we planted a vegetable garden which has since exploded with tomatoes and other veggies and we have also been getting a CSA share all summer. As of late I have made vegan cole slaw with CSA carrots and cabbage. I'm not sure what else to do with cabbage in the summer. We also have been getting a lot of beets in the CSA. I never bought beets before but I am falling love with them. I have been into making mashed beets and potatoes. This has been so delicious. I just boil the beets and potatoes together and just mash them up with almond milk and earth balance. Everything turns pink so it is beautiful and delicious. Last night we made salad with pasta, green beans, greens, apples, tomatoes, carrots, cukes, and peppers. We just steamed the green beans and threw them in. I have never eaten green beans in salad before and it is awesome. I love the CSA because it forces me to cook with things I don't normally buy like beets, cabbage and green beans. We were also getting scallions for awhile and I became a total fan. I loved the scallions in salad.
My last day of work is August 5th, then I'm going to Michigan for a week, then I am moving to Brooklyn. Holy Crap!!!!
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
I staffed at the Wooden Shoe last night. It has been awhile since I have staffed. I had to take some steps back because I was so heavily involved in everything that I was doing (zines and finance) that no one was going to take over anything unless I backed off a lot. Even if things weren't done my way I had to let other people learn through their own mistakes. It is kind of crazy that everything I was doing as the treasurer has now been broken up into jobs done by several different people. I used to enter all of the daily sales into the computer, made sure that the numbers added up, did all the cash deposits, paid all of the bills, paid the monthly sales tax, tried to keep up with budget reports, and reconciled the accounts once a month. When I was prompt with all of the duties it too so long each month. I eventually let some stuff slide because I had so much on my plate. It is nice that so many people are interested with learning finance and are keeping up with things. For so long it was just me. It took me a really long time to figure out how to teach anyone finance stuff because I had to figure it all out myself. The learning curve was steep.
I was talking to Briton the other day about how many skills we have learned from staffing at the wooden shoe. We both gained a lot from doing conflict resolution even though conflicts were pretty hard. I don't think any of the conflicts that we were involved with were fully resolved, but dealing with them instead of ignoring them were beneficial for most involved. I learned a lot of listening and communication skills and definitely got a lot more assertive as a result of being involved and challenging myself.
I feel sad that I met a lot of friends through the collective and many of them are not involved anymore. It is hard to understand what makes people leave completely, especially after working so hard to make it a better place to be. It will be weird to move away and not be involved for the next year or so. But I really don't see me wanting to volunteer at any other info shops. Mostly because I want to focus 100% on school, but also because I feel like the wooden shoe is family and you just don't go around joining other people's families. Bluestockings does have coffee though...
I am tabling this weekend at the Scranton Zine Fest! Come visit. Scranton is fun!
I was talking to Briton the other day about how many skills we have learned from staffing at the wooden shoe. We both gained a lot from doing conflict resolution even though conflicts were pretty hard. I don't think any of the conflicts that we were involved with were fully resolved, but dealing with them instead of ignoring them were beneficial for most involved. I learned a lot of listening and communication skills and definitely got a lot more assertive as a result of being involved and challenging myself.
I feel sad that I met a lot of friends through the collective and many of them are not involved anymore. It is hard to understand what makes people leave completely, especially after working so hard to make it a better place to be. It will be weird to move away and not be involved for the next year or so. But I really don't see me wanting to volunteer at any other info shops. Mostly because I want to focus 100% on school, but also because I feel like the wooden shoe is family and you just don't go around joining other people's families. Bluestockings does have coffee though...
I am tabling this weekend at the Scranton Zine Fest! Come visit. Scranton is fun!
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
I feel like I woke up on the wrong side of the bed today. Yesterday when I got to work, the phones were down from 8am until 9:20. It was amazing. Normally it is so busy on Monday mornings, especially between 8 and 9. More staff starts coming in after 9 to help with the call volume. So, it was busy all day after the phones started working again, but it felt more managable. Today it hasn't been as busy but I immediately got 2 problem callers that screamed at me like I was physically hurting them. I've had my finger on the hang up button all day today. I just can't handle the demands that people make sometimes. Customer service can be so daunting. I feel really happy that I don't go around screaming my demands at everyone and treating people like they are stupid.
Thursday, May 26, 2011
I went to the gym yesterday for the first time in about a month. I really didn't want to go but I did it anyway and it felt really good. I woke up today not hating the alarm and I feel more energized and less depressed. I have been pretty sedentary since I started working full time. Sitting around all day has been bad for my back, eyes and morale. I was only at the gym for about half an hour but it was a good first step for getting back in the habit. A few months ago I had a month free at sweat gym and I was addicted to it. I wanted to go everyday for hours. I normally only went for about an hour but all I could think about was what I wanted to do next. With so much other stuff going on I haven't had the same kind of intensity for the gym. But it still makes me feel good to go on a regular basis. Hopefully I can keep it up through the rest of the summer. The gym I go to is called Planet Fitness. I go there because it is cheap and some friends from theWooden Shoe also signed up to go. We call it the gym of the people because it was signs that say "no judgement zone" everywhere and they have pizza day and bagel day once a month. I haven't been there yet for the food days but I bet it is fun. I pay $20/month and I get to always bring a friend (usually ryan comes with me) and free tanning and half price drinks for the cooler. I haven't bought any drinks and I don't think I'll be tanning any time soon but I like being able to bring a friend.
Tuesday was Rebecca's birthday. We normally go to the movies on her birthday. This year we went to see Thor and ate so much popcorn and drank soda! The movie was fun but a little convoluted. I wish it had been a Thor/ Adventures in Babysitting crossover. Adventures in Babysitting is my only reference to Thor before this movie. It is frustrating when movies are made just to make sequels or as a set up for other movies (like the avengers). It isn't that hard to give a movie substance and all I mean by substance is a good backstory and chemistry between the characters. It was entertaining enough though. After the movie I gave Rebeccas some birthday presents including the Lady Gaga cd, the first 2 seasons of the Jersey Shore and a bottle opener with Madonna on it. I think she liked all her presents. I didn't have any wrapping paper, so I was very "green" and wrapped her presents in plastic bags and shoe boxes.
I finished the Girls to the Front book yesterday. After I finished it I spent a lot of time at work reading reviews of it and most of them were pretty spot on. It was a really fun read. There is a lot of gritty details about how things went down. I think Marcus's perception of the times and how riot grrrl resulted from everything else going on during that time period was really apt. I read Allison Wolfe's review of the book and I really enjoyed it.
http://www.nypress.com/article-21671-reconsidering-riot-grrrl.html
Marcus does always describe Wolfe as being goofy and does downplay the legitimacy of bratmobile as a band. I also really enjoyed Mike Mckee's review of the book in the Philadelphia Weekly
http://www.philadelphiaweekly.com/music/A-Misunderstood-Movement-Riot-Grrrl.html
Marcus melded together a lot of research and many interviews to craft an enthralling narrative of the times. When I started reading it I immediately got hooked. I really tried to stretch it out so I didn't finish it right away. The last chapter was a total downer. I would love to hear what other people thought of the book. I feel like I need some time to process some on the described moments of oppression olympics style cutting each other down for being privileged. That stuff is really tricky to deconstruct. It was interesting to read some of the women's perspective now on some of the extreme stuff that they did when they were younger. Like purposefully making yourself the victim to win an argument and things like that. I definitely would recommend this to anyone interested in the 90s, punk, feminism, etc. I always disconnect grunge like Nirvana from more underground punk bands and this book was a good reminder of how connected everything was before Nirvana signed to DGC and "punk broke."
The lastest issue of Bitch magazine has a good article on Courtney Love, Frances, her mother Linda Carroll, and her biological grandmother Paula Fox. I recommend it if you like that kind of stuff.
Tuesday was Rebecca's birthday. We normally go to the movies on her birthday. This year we went to see Thor and ate so much popcorn and drank soda! The movie was fun but a little convoluted. I wish it had been a Thor/ Adventures in Babysitting crossover. Adventures in Babysitting is my only reference to Thor before this movie. It is frustrating when movies are made just to make sequels or as a set up for other movies (like the avengers). It isn't that hard to give a movie substance and all I mean by substance is a good backstory and chemistry between the characters. It was entertaining enough though. After the movie I gave Rebeccas some birthday presents including the Lady Gaga cd, the first 2 seasons of the Jersey Shore and a bottle opener with Madonna on it. I think she liked all her presents. I didn't have any wrapping paper, so I was very "green" and wrapped her presents in plastic bags and shoe boxes.
I finished the Girls to the Front book yesterday. After I finished it I spent a lot of time at work reading reviews of it and most of them were pretty spot on. It was a really fun read. There is a lot of gritty details about how things went down. I think Marcus's perception of the times and how riot grrrl resulted from everything else going on during that time period was really apt. I read Allison Wolfe's review of the book and I really enjoyed it.
http://www.nypress.com/article-21671-reconsidering-riot-grrrl.html
Marcus does always describe Wolfe as being goofy and does downplay the legitimacy of bratmobile as a band. I also really enjoyed Mike Mckee's review of the book in the Philadelphia Weekly
http://www.philadelphiaweekly.com/music/A-Misunderstood-Movement-Riot-Grrrl.html
Marcus melded together a lot of research and many interviews to craft an enthralling narrative of the times. When I started reading it I immediately got hooked. I really tried to stretch it out so I didn't finish it right away. The last chapter was a total downer. I would love to hear what other people thought of the book. I feel like I need some time to process some on the described moments of oppression olympics style cutting each other down for being privileged. That stuff is really tricky to deconstruct. It was interesting to read some of the women's perspective now on some of the extreme stuff that they did when they were younger. Like purposefully making yourself the victim to win an argument and things like that. I definitely would recommend this to anyone interested in the 90s, punk, feminism, etc. I always disconnect grunge like Nirvana from more underground punk bands and this book was a good reminder of how connected everything was before Nirvana signed to DGC and "punk broke."
The lastest issue of Bitch magazine has a good article on Courtney Love, Frances, her mother Linda Carroll, and her biological grandmother Paula Fox. I recommend it if you like that kind of stuff.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)