Sunday Dinner

Tonight's dinner was beef bulgogi, brown basmati rice, and yam leaves. I'm pretty adventurous when it comes to greens at the Asian grocery store, but I have actually had yam leaves before.
The rice was yummy, it is amazing what a little butter can do. The bulgogi was a little sweet, but tasty. I overcooked the yam leaves a bit. When I was cooking them I realized I'm out of bonito. It's so frustrating. I guess I threw out the bonito I had when we were moving. Oh well, I'll put it on the grocery list.

Eka Pada Rajakapotasana

This pose has always been a goal of mine. I have been doing more yoga lately, and I have decided to work on this pose every day. At the end of the week, I'll post another photo to see if I have made any progress. I always practiced pigeon forward folding over the bent leg. Now I need to practice sitting up. I have noticed that my low back is very stiff. I am going to have to practice back bends to try and loosen that area up. My other major problem area in this pose is my shoulders. I can reach back and grab my foot, but I can't flip my arm over so that my elbow is pointing upward. Maybe I can stretch out my shoulders using a yoga strap.
So you can see my first, very sad attempt here. Not pictured is that I can actually get my rear leg to a 90 degree angle. My rear seems to be a little high--that is because my hips are tight. My left hand is down because I have to press myself back into a backbend and keep myself from falling over. Look how far my hand is from my foot! I definitely need to work on the backbending and shoulder flexibility.
Here is a pigeon pose variation. This is okay I guess. I could press my left hip toward the floor and work the front foot away from my groin. I don't like how my left hand looks, but I'm just being picky. I'll also work on this variation this week.

Random Stuff

1. Friday was my day out. I drove around Baltimore with the top down on the car. It was so nice and sunny and I got to see parts of Baltimore I hadn't ever seen before. I really didn't get out much when I lived there. I went nuts at H Mart. I hadn't been to an Asian grocery store in a couple of months. I loaded up on veggies and meat to make beef bulgogi. Cucumbers 4/$1! Mint! Ooh, I think I'll have a mojito and a Gordon's cup this week.

2. Ross is currently obsessed with fail blog.

3. No luck with the job search so far. Lisa Diane is in Singapore. She has a job she loves and she gets to travel. I'm jealous.

4. I fell below my previous low (weight wise) and have been below it for the last two weeks. I think I will meet my weight goal for this month. I worked out a lot this week (350 mins so far). I have been doing a lot of leg exercises. Man, I'm feeling them today.

5. Today we drove 75 miles (one way) to eat Logan's rolls. Damn they were good, but I don't think we'll be doing that very often.

6. We still have cable, but the cartoon network has disappeared. What Not To Wear has become my daily dose of crap tv. I'm beginning to feel the need for some structured jackets, but I don't think I'll give up my platform flip flops. That show makes me want to shop, but I resist because no one has given me a Visa card with $5,000 on it.

No, Really, I Know How to Drive

I have had the new car for about two weeks now. I am embarrassed to admit that I had to relearn how to drive (automatic). When we bought the car they dealership recharged the battery because it had been drained in the showroom by continually showing off the awesomeness of pushing a button to turn it into a convertible. Right before we drove off I asked the salesman if I was going to have trouble with the battery. He assured me everything was fine. We drove straight from the dealership to Panera. After dinner I couldn't get the car to start. I immediately thought it was the battery. Nope. The car wasn't in park. Stick shifts don't have park.

A couple days later I had more trouble. Again, park, and oh, yeah, the parking break! I think I've finally gotten into a routine now when starting the car. Sad. You'd think I'd never driven before. In my defense I've never owned an automatic car.

This morning I took Ross's Subaru to get it inspected. It was so strange--driving stick again. I didn't stall or anything, it was just odd. I do miss driving stick--I knew I would. Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny and warm. Perfect for driving with the top down. Woohoo! (That is if I can get it out of the driveway.)

Arginine, Lysine, Blah, Blah, No Chocolate?

I was super whiny yesterday. I woke up with the start of a rather large fever blister. I'm baffled. I can usually figure out what triggered the blister, but not this time. I've been slathering it with some zovirax that I had in the cabinet and some blistex. I think it is a tiny bit worse today. So anyway, I did some reading on the internet yesterday and found out that herpes needs arginine to replicate and lysine suppresses replication. I think I took 7 grams of lysine yesterday--and tried to avoid arginine rich foods. Which foods are high in arginine? Chocolate and nuts, which is exactly what I had eaten right before I read the article. So now I'm swallowing huge pills and avoiding chocolate and nuts in hopes that this sucker clears up by the end of the week. And I just made choco-matzoh!!!

Yesterday I was also whiny because my entire body was sore, but especially my neck and shoulders, and I have no idea why. My belly stung in the shower. I have a few scratches from the tree. I also have a big lump on my shin. Wah.

I have also already received 5 rejections from the 11 jobs that I applied to. Frustrating.

Tree Climbing

This afternoon we went back to Susquehanna State Park. We hiked the Deer Creek trail and found a tree that we couldn't resist climbing. I insisted on getting up by myself and almost fell off because I was laughing so hard. Getting down was just as amusing. I jumped down, landed on my bum, and my glasses flew off! No harm done though, and we had a good laugh. Now it is time to make chocolate matzo.

Flowers

I see lots of daffodils blooming on the roadsides here. It makes me miss the bluebonnets--and my garden.