I had lofty and some-what healthy plans for lunch today. A homemade...well, okay...workmade toasted turkey and Swiss sub complete with pine nut hummus. Yums. But as I was prepping my sandwich materials I noticed that my sub bread had sprouted little fuzzy green dots.../sigh. So, in a moment of weakness I threw my debit card into the hands of today's lunch lackey and she came back with a Church's chicken tender meal, mashed potatoes with gravy, and a biscuit (which I'm pretty sure was deep friend in butter and then doused with honey), which came to a whopping 660 calories. Okay, I'll admit, that's not really that bad...but it was deep fried and had something like 100,000 mg of sodium (I'm rounding up). So, with the weather being fairly good today, I left work an hour early and went for a quick 10 mile jaunt on my road bike, burning approximately 492 of those 660 calories off.
Stupid green fuzzy dots. Ruins everything it does.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Friday, November 13, 2009
Saint Stephen the Confessor
With nearly a week gone by with my new communications device, I'm proud to announce that it is no longer winning the struggle between human and machine. Up until Wednesday I'd seriously thought that I was witnessing the dawn of a robot uprising. I would open up an app only to not be able to get the app to disappear (cue movie clip: Adam Sandler yelling at the golf ball, "Why don't you go to your home?!?!?! Don't you like your home?!?!?!?!). No, joke, all day Tuesday I could not get the alarm icon to disappear off the main screen. I'd press my finger onto the icon, flick it off to the left...the icon would go zooting off in the correct direction...but alas, it wouldn't disappear into the menu. /sigh But, by Wednesday, I'd figured out all the tricks to making and moving my app icons.
So, with much elation, I'm proud to announce that I like my new cell phone and I am keeping it. And this is where the title of this post becomes relevant. I told Steve this about two hours ago, and without putting any effort into hiding his disappointment, his body sags and says, "Awwww...but I was hoping you'd hate it so much that you'd give it to me!"
....crickets....
This becomes all the more entertaining considering HE TRICKED ME INTO GETTING THE PHONE! (see previous post) This could have easily been solved with him buying the new phone I was way overdue for, stuck his SIM card in it instead, and just sunk extra cash into expanding the memory on my SLVR. But ya know, this is kinda like that episode of the Simpsons where Homer buys Marge a bowling ball for her birthday with the expectation that she won't want it and will just give it to him instead...but much to his dismay she takes up bowling. Yeah, well,...Steve, guess what...I just took up Samsung Sillouetting....or...something.
So, with much elation, I'm proud to announce that I like my new cell phone and I am keeping it. And this is where the title of this post becomes relevant. I told Steve this about two hours ago, and without putting any effort into hiding his disappointment, his body sags and says, "Awwww...but I was hoping you'd hate it so much that you'd give it to me!"
....crickets....
This becomes all the more entertaining considering HE TRICKED ME INTO GETTING THE PHONE! (see previous post) This could have easily been solved with him buying the new phone I was way overdue for, stuck his SIM card in it instead, and just sunk extra cash into expanding the memory on my SLVR. But ya know, this is kinda like that episode of the Simpsons where Homer buys Marge a bowling ball for her birthday with the expectation that she won't want it and will just give it to him instead...but much to his dismay she takes up bowling. Yeah, well,...Steve, guess what...I just took up Samsung Sillouetting....or...something.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
The Mark
So I bought a bluetooth enabled motorcyle helmet.... wait, but first let me say something else:
Ok, a small confession...I'm not a tech nerd (or whatever it is those people are calling themselves these days). As a general rule, I'm best described as a ludite. I'm usually the last to jump onto the "latest and greatest" technological bandwagon, and once I do accept some form of technology I tend to hold onto it until its considered archaic (which by today's standard is about 4 months, but in my case tends to be years). My cell phone history is a great example. I started out with a Nokia flip phone, you know that basic piece of crap they give every new cell phone subscriber for free...in fact, its so shitty they may actually pay you to take it off their hands. I upgraded to a Motorola SLVR four or five years ago...yeah, seriously...who the hell keeps a cell phone for four years these days? Even better, how many cell phones actually last four years? Anyway, I love the SLVR so I've been very hesitant to part with it, as is the way of ludites.
Right, so I bought a bluetooth enabled helmet. It's a pretty nifty concept...well to someone out of the technological loop it seems pretty nifty...phone and music through a bluetooth device. Nice! But after searching the net for a reasonably priced bluetooth MP3 player and coming up with nothing, Steve says, "it would be cheaper to just buy a new cell phone." Now Steve knows I don't want a new cell phone. He's tried to seperate me from my SLVR for years, and to no avail. So it's with this knowledge that I'm going to go ahead and say that he tricked me into buying a new cell tonight. He'd bought the same bluetooth helmet as I, but his was having limited range so I'd pretty much resigned myself to just having a bluetooth helmet sans working bluetooth capabilities without ever really plugging the damn thing in and testing it out. But I did, and to my surprise, it connects and has a range of 10+ feet. Sweet!
So Steve chimes in with, "well now all we need to do is get you a bluetooth device that will hold lots of songs, we could go to Best Buy." So with 30 minutes til closing time we speed to Best Buy, pick out a new cell phone (a Samsung Sillouette btw), fiddle about with the phone over dinner and then go to Walmart to purchase a memory card to hold all these songs. And it was on the drive back to the house when my brain put one and one together. I'd just been tricked into buying a new cell phone. Because, my SLVR has an iTunes app and Bluetooth and a memory card. All it needed was a larger memory card so that the phone would hold a practical number of songs.
I mean sure, the new phone is nifty and new and has lots of cool features (like GPS with vocal turn-by-turn directions or I could watch streaming video),...but there was and still is nothing wrong with my SLVR. Its a great phone and it (and I) have smuggly sat back as friends with lesser communications devices have had to upgrade because their latest and greatest phone has turned out to be a total piece of shit. And here I am, with my own latest and greatest phone, loading songs and transferring contacts...and keep asking myself,...how the hell did I get talked into this again?
Dammit.
Geeks: 1.
Jen: 0.
Ok, a small confession...I'm not a tech nerd (or whatever it is those people are calling themselves these days). As a general rule, I'm best described as a ludite. I'm usually the last to jump onto the "latest and greatest" technological bandwagon, and once I do accept some form of technology I tend to hold onto it until its considered archaic (which by today's standard is about 4 months, but in my case tends to be years). My cell phone history is a great example. I started out with a Nokia flip phone, you know that basic piece of crap they give every new cell phone subscriber for free...in fact, its so shitty they may actually pay you to take it off their hands. I upgraded to a Motorola SLVR four or five years ago...yeah, seriously...who the hell keeps a cell phone for four years these days? Even better, how many cell phones actually last four years? Anyway, I love the SLVR so I've been very hesitant to part with it, as is the way of ludites.
Right, so I bought a bluetooth enabled helmet. It's a pretty nifty concept...well to someone out of the technological loop it seems pretty nifty...phone and music through a bluetooth device. Nice! But after searching the net for a reasonably priced bluetooth MP3 player and coming up with nothing, Steve says, "it would be cheaper to just buy a new cell phone." Now Steve knows I don't want a new cell phone. He's tried to seperate me from my SLVR for years, and to no avail. So it's with this knowledge that I'm going to go ahead and say that he tricked me into buying a new cell tonight. He'd bought the same bluetooth helmet as I, but his was having limited range so I'd pretty much resigned myself to just having a bluetooth helmet sans working bluetooth capabilities without ever really plugging the damn thing in and testing it out. But I did, and to my surprise, it connects and has a range of 10+ feet. Sweet!
So Steve chimes in with, "well now all we need to do is get you a bluetooth device that will hold lots of songs, we could go to Best Buy." So with 30 minutes til closing time we speed to Best Buy, pick out a new cell phone (a Samsung Sillouette btw), fiddle about with the phone over dinner and then go to Walmart to purchase a memory card to hold all these songs. And it was on the drive back to the house when my brain put one and one together. I'd just been tricked into buying a new cell phone. Because, my SLVR has an iTunes app and Bluetooth and a memory card. All it needed was a larger memory card so that the phone would hold a practical number of songs.
I mean sure, the new phone is nifty and new and has lots of cool features (like GPS with vocal turn-by-turn directions or I could watch streaming video),...but there was and still is nothing wrong with my SLVR. Its a great phone and it (and I) have smuggly sat back as friends with lesser communications devices have had to upgrade because their latest and greatest phone has turned out to be a total piece of shit. And here I am, with my own latest and greatest phone, loading songs and transferring contacts...and keep asking myself,...how the hell did I get talked into this again?
Dammit.
Geeks: 1.
Jen: 0.
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Halloween Festivities
Steve and I headed to Knoxville this weekend to celebrate Halloween with Gabe and Em. Friday night was meant to be a pumpkin carving event. I had a brilliant idea for a jack-o-lantern: buy a large white pumpkin and carve it into the shape of a ghost from the classic Atari game, Pac-Man. But the fates were against me. There was a guy selling white pumpkins for $3 at a stand, but when I went to buy one no one was in. Okay...sure I could have liberated a pumpkin and dumped the cash in its place. But well...too honest I guess. But besides *not* having a pumpkin for the event, we got into Knoxville so late that we'd missed the carving party. So, while waiting for Gabe and Em to get home we watched Sean of the Dead and ate Doritoes and donuts.
Saturday we all dressed up and attended a couple of parties. Emilie went at a hot demon, Gabe went as a prison convict (but only after his attempt at making a good Sideshow Bob costume failed), Steve went as a couch potato...again, and I went as a Greaser, more specifically I was aiming for Sodapop from The Outsiders (this was an impromptu costume after inadvertently leaving my original costume at home). The first party...while in concept was cool, actually sucked because of the rain. It was an outdoor bonfire party hosted by Gabe and Em's hiking meetup group. There was tasty food and a huge ass fire...but after standing in the rain for two hours it got a little tiresome. So we headed to some people's house I didn't know, but apparently have met before. We hung out with the "strangers" and some newly acquired friends I made on my last Knoxville/D.C. trip...and the night pretty much ended as expected: Steve vomiting his guts out.
Sunday we met up with Allison and Ron (the newly acquired friends) for a hangover cure breakfast at Mimi's Cafe. Afterwards we went to a world market and bought British chocolate and teas, went to a few other shops and then spent the rest of the day lounging about, watching movies, playing games, etc until bedtime. It was a great weekend, but very tiring. :)
Note- pics of the costumes are the exclusive property of Steve's cell phone. If he should ever chose to share them I'd post a couple here.
Saturday we all dressed up and attended a couple of parties. Emilie went at a hot demon, Gabe went as a prison convict (but only after his attempt at making a good Sideshow Bob costume failed), Steve went as a couch potato...again, and I went as a Greaser, more specifically I was aiming for Sodapop from The Outsiders (this was an impromptu costume after inadvertently leaving my original costume at home). The first party...while in concept was cool, actually sucked because of the rain. It was an outdoor bonfire party hosted by Gabe and Em's hiking meetup group. There was tasty food and a huge ass fire...but after standing in the rain for two hours it got a little tiresome. So we headed to some people's house I didn't know, but apparently have met before. We hung out with the "strangers" and some newly acquired friends I made on my last Knoxville/D.C. trip...and the night pretty much ended as expected: Steve vomiting his guts out.
Sunday we met up with Allison and Ron (the newly acquired friends) for a hangover cure breakfast at Mimi's Cafe. Afterwards we went to a world market and bought British chocolate and teas, went to a few other shops and then spent the rest of the day lounging about, watching movies, playing games, etc until bedtime. It was a great weekend, but very tiring. :)
Note- pics of the costumes are the exclusive property of Steve's cell phone. If he should ever chose to share them I'd post a couple here.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
About Time
So Clarksville's very first Greenway opened in late September. Yeah, seriously, way to join the greenway revolution...decades late. But hey, better late than never. The CGW (not to be confused with Clarksville Gas & Water) is only in phase 1 --which equates to some 2.5- 3.0 miles of asphalt. Right now it's barely long enough to work up a good sweat, but it already has far more potential than Ashland City's out-and-back 6 mile greenway. I'm often disappointed in greenways that lead to...nowhere. To me, these rails-to-trails projects should serve the dual function of both green space and practical green mobility. What's the use in a fancy schmancy paved path if you still have to risk your life by getting on Clarksville's mean streets to get to work/campus/pub/etc. I want a REAL greenway, the cyclist's version of a highway or parkway. I probably shouldn't judge Clarksville Greenway Phase I, but I have my suspicions that once the project is complete I will be resigned to accept it as a recreational space, and nothing more.
Monday, October 5, 2009
Rotary Ride
I expected Steve to have blogged about our first ride on our new bikes (oh yeah, Steve just had to buy a new bike too...he got the Cannondale F7) by now. But I guess I'm going to have to do that (even though he has the pics).
Anyway, we picked up Steve's bike from the local bike shop on Saturday afternoon and headed to Rotary Park to try out our new toys. It was a fun ride, but a lot of technical stuff on the trails that I didn't have to tackle at the DGD race. Rotary Park doesn't have moguls (or at least any that I found) but it did have lots of sharp switchbacks, creek crossings, and obstacles (both natural (boulders) and man-made (like, oooh, this part of the trail is really boring, lets fell a few trees here)).
Steve seemed really stoked about our latest adventure in cycling (and that excitement stayed even after taking a fall). Steve is not so much a nature-loving guy, seriously, he hates trees and flying insects and pretty much anything with more than two legs...but he's enthusiastic about our new purchases. So hopefully, despite nature, we can get out on the trail often this autumn.
Anyway, I think Rotary Park will be a good testing ground for us over the next few months. I think the trails are, for the most part, appropriate to our beginner status, but with enough difficulty that we can really grow into them. I'm looking forward to some cold-weather riding on the trails...game on!
Anyway, we picked up Steve's bike from the local bike shop on Saturday afternoon and headed to Rotary Park to try out our new toys. It was a fun ride, but a lot of technical stuff on the trails that I didn't have to tackle at the DGD race. Rotary Park doesn't have moguls (or at least any that I found) but it did have lots of sharp switchbacks, creek crossings, and obstacles (both natural (boulders) and man-made (like, oooh, this part of the trail is really boring, lets fell a few trees here)).
Steve seemed really stoked about our latest adventure in cycling (and that excitement stayed even after taking a fall). Steve is not so much a nature-loving guy, seriously, he hates trees and flying insects and pretty much anything with more than two legs...but he's enthusiastic about our new purchases. So hopefully, despite nature, we can get out on the trail often this autumn.
Anyway, I think Rotary Park will be a good testing ground for us over the next few months. I think the trails are, for the most part, appropriate to our beginner status, but with enough difficulty that we can really grow into them. I'm looking forward to some cold-weather riding on the trails...game on!
Friday, October 2, 2009
A Champion's Bike
So you may have heard (probably multiple times if you hang around Steve) that I won a mountain bike race a few weeks ago. Okay, okay...competition was hardly of the stiff variety, but still, I finished first in the women's division. But that's not even the amazing part...I finished on a P.O.S. Walmart-special-yard-sale-find that cost all of $45 (I probably paid too much). If you've ever seen this Purple Trail Eater (as it has since been dubbed) you'd understand the enormity of my win. Anyway, ever since Steve has been insisting that a champion mountain biker needs a champion mountain bike. He's been egged on by workmate and semi-pro mtn biker, Scott McConnell (who rides for the Moots mtn bike team). It's actually been a pretty interesting dynamic that's develop between us...Steve wants to see me on a proper mtn bike but with as little financial layout as possible...Scott wants to see me on a mtn bike but wants to see Steve fork out as much money as I want him to spend on it...and me? well I just want a mtn bike that doesn't chap my ass. :)
So, after much window shopping and many test rides, I purchased my first, real, honest-to-goodness mountain bike, a Cannondale F5. It's sweeeeet...
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