Breakables

Wednesday night, in an attempt to set a dish on the counter, I accidentally dropped it on the floor. Oops.

Thursday night, while putting my computer on the table, I knocked over a glass, which shattered perfectly around the middle into a shorter glass and a ring. Don’t know how I did it, but I did.

John asked, politely, if I could try not to break anything today, Friday.

So it’s a good thing that I took my breakfast out today on a plastic plate. I had to go get blood drawn before eating, so I took toast and a banana with me when I ran out the door. Then, on the way to the doctor’s office, some jerk pulled in front of me and I had to slam on my breaks. The breaks locked, I skidded a bit, but all was well and both cars remained intact.

The plate went sailing onto the floor, as did all my food.

At least my toast landed butter-side up!

And with just over an hour to go, I haven’t broken anything yet today.

Of course, with a scuba weekend ahead, there’s always toes and tanks to be wary of. Wish me luck!

Gym membership

Well, I joined a gym.

I re-gained a not-totally-insignificant amount of the weight I lost a year and a half ago, and haven’t had any luck with re-losing it based on the old methods. Plus, with the shoulder injury still preventing some if not all of certain activities, I felt like my ability to exercise was pretty limited. Hence, Sarah the slug. Not so good.

My exercise is still limited by my shoulder/rotator cuffs, but at least I’ve expanded my options.

The gym’s not far from my house, on the way home from work, has wight machines that I know and like (and thus aren’t intimidated by), and some good treadmill/stationary bike stuff. No elipticals, but they’re apparently looking into them.

My goal is 2-3 times a week, so we’ll see. Of course, I can’t do any of the arm/shoulder weights for now, not with the physical therapy still limited to less than 5 lbs, but some day!

And I’m really hoping that I’ll commit to this this time around. So far, it’s been a super friendly place, with very nice people, so we’ll see. No kickboxing class (alas, alack) and plenty of yoga (banned for life by the physical therapist, sadly), but all else seems good.

Here’s to getting back to the weight of a year and a half ago!

Best thing in my life this morning?

A husband, who last night, jokingly referred to the line from Shrek:

“And in the morning, I’m making waffles!”

And then this morning, as we enjoyed our first sips of fresh-made coffee (mmmm, Trader Joe’s coffeee!), turned to me and asked, perfectly seriously:

“Do you want blueberries in your waffles?”

Ahh, true love!

Where to start?

Life has been so full of stuff lately that I feel like I haven’t had a chance to sit and breathe, let alone do anything extra. There’ve been scuba classes to teach, research symposium applications to finish, weddings to help with and attend, plus all sorts of work.

The biggest thing John and I had on our plate lately was Elizabeth and Mark’s wedding. We’ve been having all sorts of lunch and dinner parties to help the happy couple make table center pieces or arrange favors or have bridal showers. We’ve been on a number of bike rides to help the bride tone her arms and back. It’s been really great to watch two people so clearly in love, and so right for one another. Plus meeting all of their other friends has been a blast.

Their wedding was last weekend, and it was beautiful. Hot as hades, but beautiful. Full Catholic mass ceremony, which was a bit much for a non-air-conditioned church (one of my friends from high school nearly passed out but made it through), and a great reception. We’d helped set up the reception area beforehand, so knew how nice it was going to be. There was also a post-wedding brunch, for which my oven was on at 400deg for 2 hours on Saturday, while the outside temperature was hovering around 100deg. Hot, but the food was oh-so-tasty.

Elizabeth and Mark are off on their honeymoon for the next couple of weeks, and I’m sort of sad to not have them around, and to have no more wedding party excuses for getting together, but we’ll be back to our usual routine the minute they’re home, I’m sure.

The other big thing that’s been taking up my time, and absorbing most of my words, is my paper, which was submitted Monday to a journal, and has been sent out for review. Such a relief. I went home Monday, sprawled on the couch, and didn’t move for hours. That may have been due to the heat, in part, but still. It’s done, or at least I don’t have to think about it for 4-6 weeks. Cross your fingers for me, will you?

I’m pretty proud of this paper. Yes, maybe it’s not as great as it could have been with massive more experiments (there’s always another paper, I suppose), and no, it’s not going to change the world, and yes, it’ll likely be one of two instead of a whole handful that I end up graduating with, but that work? It’s mine. I did it. I completed it, with lots of help, but it’s still mine. And I’m pretty proud of that, regardless of the comments that have been thrown at me in the past about it.

Now to just get a second paper out and aim to graduate sometime. Key word: sometime.

But hopefully with the paper done, I’ll be around a bit more. I’ve clearly kind of forgotten how to do this whole blogging thing, but hopefully it’s like riding a bicycle, which, hey, I’m allowed to do again! Here’s to the paper being sent off, and theoretically only 2-3 more months of physical therapy! Whee!

Empty Nesters

We are, as of sometime yesterday, officially empty nesters.

Both babies were in their nest on Tuesday evening, but Wednesday morning, one was gone, and the other had flown by the evening. I think the nest simply wasn’t big enough for them to stick around any longer.

(Although, did you know hummingbirds weave spiderwebs into and around their nests to hold them together but allow for expansion as the babies grow? So cool!) (I googled.)

We’re both hoping they made it through their first flights safely, and have found food and shelter to replace the cozy accommodations Mama and Nest had made. I’m sad to see them go, but maybe she’ll come back and next next year?

You know…

You know it’s been a long couple of hours and days at work when you’re scrolling through titles of journal articles online and misread “decapeptide” as “decapitation”.

Clearly, a weekend is in order!

Oh, look, there’s one now!

Baby beaks

Here’s the nest with the two little beaks pointing out of it (one at about 12:00 and the other at about 1:00). They cheep away like mad while mom’s out hunting down sustenance, except when we or our neighbor walk in and out of the walkway. I love seeing them when I leave in the morning, and returning to see them in the evening.

The hummingbird nest

Remember how we have a hummingbird nest right outside our door?

Well, MommaBird hadn’t been around in awhile, or at least not when I was coming and going from home, so I was a bit concerned.

And then, yesterday, as I was leaving the house, two little hummingbird baby heads were poking out of the nest to greet me.

So awesome, and a lovely start to a kick-ass Friday that ended with 21 people in an awesome scuba class (good lord that was tiring) followed by a home-cooked meal from Cara!

Something to aspire to

Just when I’m about to throw my hands up in despair over writing and rewriting my damned discussion 972 times and still not getting it the least bit right at all, something comes along to make me feel better.

After all, if a 96-year old man can pull all-nighters and earn his master’s degree, I can write a couple words, right?

(And when I’m done with the latest draft and have sent it off to various people to be torn apart again, I’ll tell you all about Boston.)

So proud!

My sister graduated from Harvard today with a Masters in Higher Education.

And promptly got a job offer.

I couldn’t be prouder of her and her accomplishments of the past year!