Monthly Archives: April 2010

Looks like I’m moving in a month! The sellers have agreed to fix the majority of the issues that we found at the inspection, so if everything goes according to plan, we’ll close on May 27th! Yup, that means that we met the deadline and we’ll be getting $8000 from Uncle Sam. (Anyone happen to know how file an adjusted 2009 tax return as two unmarried people who purchased a house together?) Jason and I have already lived together for over a year and a half, but purchasing our first home together is very exciting. We keep saying how we feel like real adults now, but not really. I’m not going to lie, I am definitely a little bit scared. Mostly of the following:

1. My commute to work. I have no idea how long it’s going to take. This house is only about 5-6 miles farther than my current house, but it’s a different route. The most direct way would be to take 285 but it has a reputation of being like a parking lot in rush hour. I’ll figure it out. I’m good with finding back roads and such but it’ll take some getting used to. I’m hoping it’ll take about 45 minutes, but I don’t know.

2. This sort of goes along with number one, but I’m a little scared to move into the suburbs. This house is barely outside the city, but I’ve been such a die-hard ITP-er (it’s a weird Atlanta thing, it means inside the perimeter which is I-285.) that I’m kind of scared to leave the bubble. I don’t know why. I don’t know if I’m scared that I won’t see my friends as much or I’ll become a suburbanite or what. Maybe I’m scared that I won’t get to go to Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods as much because they are a whopping ten miles away!

3. Money. Our mortgage payment is not going to be that much more than our current rent which is great when you compare the size of where we live now to the size of the new house. So, I’m not really worried about that. What I am worried about, however, is things breaking. I’ve always rented, so if the toilet breaks, I just call the landlord, not the plumber. I’ve never had to use my own money to fix anything. Then there is always that constant fear of what if one of us gets laid off. We just had layoffs at work today which was scary even though I wasn’t affected. How would we pay for things? But that fear is always going to be there in this economy no matter if I’m renting or owning.

4. Arguing with my mother. We’re buying the house. She’s going to have to get over it. There is just tension present all the time now between she and I and I’m honestly worried that it’s going to be there for a long time. (She thinks the house feeds into a bad high school and that we shouldn’t buy it for that reason. That’s what the fights are about.) I am not a fighter. I hate arguing with people and the fact that we’ve been fighting about this so much has really taken a toll on me. If it’s not one form of family drama, it’s another. Trust me on that one.

So, those are the scary things. But there are a lot more things that I’m excited about.

1. Having a yard for Murphy. I would like to maybe start a garden and start composting too. I’m not sure how that works with a curious dog.

2. Having a bigger kitchen that Jason and I can both be in at that same time without tripping over one another. This is a major one. I hate our current kitchen with a passion.

3. Not hearing my neighbors fight through the walls. Not having to worry that my neighbors hear Murphy barking through the walls.

4. Getting a grill and cooking out on the deck. Also, painting the deck and learning to do some DIY home improvement stuff.

5. Having dinner parties. Our current house is too small to have more than two other people over. Really, our current table is too small, but there is no room for a bigger table.

6. Decorating. Our current house still sort of has that college mismatched feel to it. Hopefully, we can get some furniture that actually matches. Eventually.

7. This house in general. It is very cool, sort of modern and retro at the same time. I haven’t posted any pictures yet because all of the ones that I have still have the sellers things in them. But, after they move out, I’ll post some.

8. Even though I’m scared to move to the suburbs, a part of me is ready to quiet down a little bit. I want to focus more on cooking, running, gardening, photography, that type of thing, rather than staying out partying until 1 am. That’s not to say that I never want to go to a bar again, because that’s simply untrue, but I think that living a little farther from all of my normal haunts will force me to slow down.

Good thing that I like to be busy, because the next two months are going to be positively insane!

May 27th – closing on house
May 30th weekend – moving
June 5th – DC for bridal shower & other wedding planning
June 12th – bachelorette party
June 26th – wedding
July 4 – Peachtree Road Race
July 6 – Hawaii

I got through April and it’s craziness, so I can get through this. It’s really just June that’s going to be busy. May will be spent sorting through our belongings, deciding what to pack and what to toss and doing some loan stuff, but hopefully nothing too stressful. I feel like I need to start resting up for June now! For my sanity, I need to make sure that working out and eating healthy don’t fall to the wayside during this busy time. Just writing this post made me feel very excited for these upcoming events.

Yesterday started off badly but ended up being a good day. It started badly because of an on-going argument that I’m having with my mother regarding the purchase of the house. We argued (for the millionth time) on Monday night, but I went to sleep upset about it and the upset feeling was still there when I woke up.

I brought my workout clothes to work and during my lunch break, I went to the office gym and did the following interval workout on the treadmill:

3 minute warm-up
2 minute jog at 5.5 mph
1 minute run at 7.5 mph

Repeat jog, run intervals 5 times
3 minute cool-down

This ended up being a little over 2 miles in 23 minutes, I’m not sure of the exact mileage.

After that I did some abs. I have a confession to make. I’ve been slacking a little bit on the Ab Ripper X DVD of P90X. The Ab Ripper routine is a 15 minute DVD that is supposed to follow whatever strength DVD you might be doing for the day. Problem is, after I finish a 60 minute strength routine, the last thing I want to do is pop in another DVD! So, to make up for the fact that I didn’t do abs after shoulders and chest on Monday, I did a routine yesterday. I did 12 sets of each and then repeated the routine.

in and outs
bicycles (forward)
bicycles (backward)
reverse crunches
lowering legs (I have no idea what this is called. When your legs are at a 90 degree angle when your on your back and you lower them to the floor and back up.)
oblique v-ups (12 each side.) I found this to be much easier on one side than the other for some reason
oblique twist (12 each side)

I was a sweaty mess by the end of all this and my mood was much better too.

After work, I met Jason at Men’s Wearhouse so he could get fitted for his tuxedo! Scratch another big thing off the wedding to-do list! After that, we decided to go to Muss & Turner’s for dinner. I’ve had this gift card there for over a year. We’ve never used it because although the restaurant is near my office, it’s not near our house. Since dinner was basically free, we decided to get more expensive things than we’d normally order.

We started off with a cheese plate. We had the brie and the cheddar which came with two types of jam.

For my entree, I had the halibut.

Jason told me that his meals never get any blog love so here you go. He had the steak.

Muss & Turners is one of those restaurants where I can appreciate that the food is good, but it’s food that I don’t really like. Nothing on the menu jumped out at me at all. Everything seemed to be very heavy on the meat or fried or in lots of oil (see pictures above to illustrate that last one). Very Southern style cooking, which I’m not particularly fond of. Nevertheless, we had a nice time.

But.

I feel like I’ve been eating very poorly for the last two weeks or so and this needs to stop immediately. Between going to MD and my birthday, there has been a lot of going out to eat and with that came a lot of drinking. I’m declaring this celebration officially over! Obviously, I don’t want to gain weight before my wedding! But secondly, we are going to need a lot of stuff for the new house and we should be spending our money on that, not restaurant food and drink! Somehow I need to figure out a way to not go out much but not turn into a hermit either.

Enter home cooked meal for dinner. I finally made the black beans and rice that I’d planned to make on Sunday night with a side of carrot fries. A co-worker gave me the bean recipe and I have no idea where it came from, but I’ll share it since it’s so basic.

I coated the carrot fries in olive oil and ranch seasoning. They were okay, but I definitely prefer sweet potato fries. I guess these are lower calorie though.

Black Beans and Rice from Lee’s Co-worker (tweeked a little)

2/3 white onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tbsp canola oil
1/2 tsp oregano
2/3 cup water
1 can stewed tomatoes with mexican seasoning
1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
1 cup uncooked brown rice

• Heat oil on medium-high heat. Saute garlic and onion in oil for 5 minutes.
• Add oregano, water, tomato and beans. Bring to a boil.
• Add rice, return to a boil. Then let reduce heat to low. Cover and simmer for 5 minutes.
• Remove from heat. Let sit for 10 minutes.
• Pour generous amounts of Frank’s on rice.

I stopped at Trader Joe’s after Pilates last night and picked up some food. The problem with Trader Joe’s is that I buy a lot of things there, but nothing that really works together as a meal. Though I suppose that’s the danger of shopping anywhere without a grocery list. I had planned to make beans and rice for dinner but accidently purchased tomato sauce instead of stewed tomatoes. So I ended up eating hummus and baked chips with a side of sliced mango. Not the most balanced of meals, is it? I find that whenever I have a snacky sort of dinner, I can never really get full. Full isn’t the right word. More like I never am satisfied. That leads to a lot more snacking. It’s just a vicious cycle. Moral of the story – make meals for dinner!!

By the way – Trader Joe’s Whole Grain Drink: GROSS!! Major TJ fail. I should have bought the almond milk that I was going to originally buy. Or just stuck with cow’s milk since that’s what Jason prefers and I don’t drink much milk anyway.

I stopped at Kroger after work tonight to get the correct tomatoes. I was going to make the beans and rice but Jason wanted the other dinner that I had ingredients for – Inside Out Lasagna

On the side, I roasted some broccoli. For my roasted broccoli, I tossed some fresh broccoli with about a tablespoon of olive oil. I sprinkled it with Adobo and stuck it in a 375 oven for half an hour. When it was done, I sprinkled it with parmesan cheese. Yum.

Today marked the beginning of the fifth week of P90X which means that I’m scheduled to use some of the DVDs that I haven’t used before. Today was chest and shoulders. I’m going to take pictures to see if I can notice any changes from the way I looked at the beginning and now. I don’t expect to see much of a difference, but I do think that my arms have a little more definition.