I am thankful for bunny life

I am thankful that Gus has not killed our bunny and made her into dinner.

I am thankful for Bruce

I am thankful that Bruce Springsteen is making a new album and embarking on what I am sure will be an incredibly spectacular world tour.

thankful for Mexican ...

I am thankful that I have a fabulous Mexican restaurant nearby and that everyone there treats me like family and the queso flows as abundantly as the margaritas :)

I am thankful for you...

I am thankful for you all, my fearless readers who call me out on month long hiatuses and lack of insights. Your quiet support radiates through my computer monitor and forces me to be more insightful about the everyday occurrences of my life. You have given me the gift of reflection and an outlet for all of my nonsensical ramblings and observations. Thanks loves J

So much to be thankful for!

I just wanted to wish you all the best Thanksgiving ever. I for one have lots to be thankful for and need to do a better job of appreciating how amazing my life truly is instead of just focusing on whats wrong with me and what I don't have.

I got lots of love and that is good enough for me :)
Herms and I will be going to Cleveburg for Thanksgiving to eat lots of pie with my fabulous Cassidy crew. Can't wait to see everyone and I will update you with lots of pics from our Northern adventures!

State of the Erin Address

Hello lovas!

I returned from a fabulous trip home a week ago and while abroad in the old Commonwealth I was widely chastised for my failure to write on my blog more. The accusations are true as evidently my last entry was mid-July. My bad. It was actually really touching how many of you guys told me that you missed reading the old blog, and that you felt like you did not know what was going on in my life because I never updated anymore. All fair and valid points made by you my dear friends/family. I think my favorite request for more updates came from my Grandpa Greene who told me that after reading my last entry he came to the conclusion that "if I was not offending someone, then I was doing something wrong". Love it, so with the full force and backing of my awesome Grandfathers approval I will commence with my 'State of the Erin' address.

I recently returned home from an awesome trip home where I was able to literally accomplish every single one of my goals, and see everyone I needed to see and do everything I needed to do. I went to CNU's homecoming where I celebrated my 5 year class reunion (yeesh), I attended a baby shower for my personal hero, the crazy Stephanie Anderson who is going to pop in December, I toured my alma mater Trinity and saw all the insanely fancy upgrades they made to the place (thanks Hilary for being a fabulous and patient tour guide), I saw my high school best friends, my Williamsburg best friends, my college best friends, my parents best friends, I got to go to Ernies and celebrate my grandparents birthdays with oreo pudding and the chasing of fake turkeys named Templeton, I got to have lunch and dinners with dear friends who I never get to see, I went shopping and attended happy hours and the cherry on top was I got to spend tons of time with my parents doing silly things like making salads and watching inappropriate movies. Really fantastic vacation. Could not have asked for anything better and it was positively affirming in that I am still loved and people think I am cool and will invest time in having conversations with me :)

I have likened the difference in So. Ill Erin and Commonwealth Erin to the differences between Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus. For those who don't know I am obsessed with Hannah, the wigs and the sparkles etc. really speak to me. However, in all actuality in my current life I am much more like Miley, simple hometown girl from Tennessee. Shes the same person with lots of different aspects. I feel like sometimes I fit into both places perfectly, and then other times I feel like I don't fit into either place at all. When I am at home I enjoy my friends, family, great restaurants and activities and being in demand with people who actually want to see me, but at the same time I miss my house, and my boyfriend and being a little calmer. When I am here I just want to be there, but when I am there I just want to be here. It is all very confusing really. I hope that someday I will be able to consolidate both sides and live closer to home and not have it be such an epic adventure everytime I want to see the people that I love. *fingers crossed*

So that's something I have been mulling over for a few weeks. On the less philosophical home front Gus and I have blatantly ripped off a tradition that my parents and their "peeps" started of making big fires and sitting around them gossiping and drinking. While I was gone Gus made a little brick patio and bought an adorable fire pit and I went out and picked out 5 pink plastic Adirondack chairs and we are hoping that this fall/winter sitting around outside a fire outside will catch on and we will entertain with lots of smores and hot dogs and such. We had a few friends over Sunday night and for its inaugural run the fire went super well. Gus is still working out the dynamics of making the 'perfect fire' at one point he lit himself on fire with lighter fluid and he is currently missing much of the arm hair on his right arm :) Its cute though watching boys around a fire they all turn into cub scouts looking for twigs and criticizing the embers or what not . Hopefully there will be much bonding and ghost stories around our new toy. We have been trying to think of a good name for the fire pit experience. Since it has stars and moons on the sides of it my girlfriend Allison decided to name the firepit "Uranus" so that when I text her to come over she can reply "hurray we are going to set Uranus on fire!!!". Tragically I think the name might stick if left unchecked so I have to stop the madness soon.

Also, as you all know since I have not stopped talking about it I am currently addicted to Pinterest. If you are not on Pinterest you need to be RIGHT NOW. Seriously do it, it will change your life for the better. www.pinterest.com. Go. Make it happen. I will wait.....

Great you are signed up for Pinterest. Awesome.

Now let me tell you how it has changed my life. It is a board full of amazing inspiration, ideas, recipes, creativity, joy, beauty, brilliance, craftiness. I cannot emphasis this enough, my girlfriends told me about it and I scoffed and then joined and then became addicted. I will not lie to you, it is an addiction. Also I have found myself saying this alot "found it on Pinterest!" and then Gus rolls his eyes but he loves everything I make from it. I don't know how the world has lived so long without this site but thank the sweet baby Jesus that we no longer have to live without its aspirational perfection. I hope to see all of your boards very soon pleaseandthankyou.


Now if you are one of the naysayers that I have encountered let me just say this, the most common argument against Pinterst is that you just don't have time for it, but I say as a rebuttal you just don't have time not to Pin. There are so many great tips and ideas that you wander around thinking "why didn't I think of that???" It really is a literal lifesaver and has awakened a very long dormant creativity within myself. The glue gun is back out, I am playing with fabric and acrylic paints again. It is like a time warp back to 2005, I feel like a kid again :) Do it, you will thank me later I promise.


There is more stuff going on I am sure. I will write to you more as I remember. My grandpa asked if I needed a voice recorder to take dictation of all of my 'blog thoughts' honestly I probably do but I think that the extreme stream of conscious randomness that goes through my head daily might be too much for a shiny little machine to handle. I will try make notes on post its or some such thing. Maybe I can make a Pinterest board of blog ideas :)

Love you guys <3

The great weight debate

I have not written a honest to goodness heartfelt blog in a minute I realize, but that is because I have gotten in a bit of a social pickle with my honesty in past blog entries and rather than censor myself I just declined to write at all. They say that the pen is mightier than the sword, and that words hurt etc. and apparently that is true. My friend Allison and I have this joke that every time I send out an email or an invite here in So. Ill I manage to offend someone. Either I have a strange sense of humor that no one else gets or I am just outright offensive. For example I asked that my guests not bring Wal-Mart potato salad to Easter because it was a nice meal which was evidently offensive. I don’t get that one at all, its offensive to me that anyone would even entertain that thought of doing that. I also declined an invite to go berry picking on a 96 degree day because and I quote " I don’t like to play day laborer on the weekends”. Ok now I can see how that might be a little offensive.


Meh, that's just me though.


I started this blog as a forum to express what I was going through, and to share my experiences with my peeps back home. The trouble arose when I relayed frustrations about situations out here that were then read by people who took offense, and now they don’t talk to me or invite me to things. To be fair though I never said anything in blog form that I would not have said in real life, I don’t know if that is really a good justification for inadvertently hurting people’s feelings though.So long story short that is why I have not been as forthright with you as I have been in the past.


To fill you in on what I am currently pondering I have been thinking much about the subject of weight. In particular mine obviously and really trying to go back to the roots of my issues with food/happiness/love and how they all play into my life. A few summer ago I went on this big great health kick and lost tons of weight I was working out everyday and followed my Weight Watchers guidelines like they were biblical decrees. That super healthy period of my life though was motivated by loneliness and boredom, My life was basically work out and cook painstakingly healthy meals because I had nothing better to do. The same can be said when I came back from Ireland thinner, I walked everywhere and was so homesick that I made myself physically sick and food just did not seem that appealing. The thinnest I have been in the past decade was a direct result of mono and you should read some of the stuff I wrote in that period, holy melodramatic batman. Which leads me to beg the question what about misery makes me healthier, or at least thinner?


Why is it that when I am super happy I gain all this weight, which in turn makes me less happy?
What a truly vicious cycle.


I don't think it is an uncommon plight at all. You see and hear about people who suffer tragedies all the time who lose dramatic amounts of weight, and of course the dreaded 'boyfriend weight' where you finally feel comfortable and loved so you eat more cheese and drink more beer. What is the balance?


I have never been, nor will I ever be a 'thin girl'. This is not self-pitying or self deprecating and I don't feel bad thinking or saying that. I have never wanted to be 'thin', all of my role models throughout my entire life have been curvy if not downright plump and I think they are beautiful. That being said I hate arm fat and muffin tops and not having my clothes fit properly, so there is definitely a balance to strike between being healthy and feeling good about yourself. I have been on some form of Weight Watchers since I was 8 years old as I have always been a big girl, who needed special shoes and could not fit into Mudd jeans in middle school. Thats fine, and I am glad that I was taught how to eat properly from a young age.


However, there is a distinct difference between knowing what to do to be healthy and actually living it. It is one thing to know that Taco Bell is not a healthy choice and it is another to not crave nachos Belle Grande at 3pm on an idle Tuesday. I did not grow up around food that was bad for me. There were never chips, or cookies or junk in the house. I remember alot of stir fry's and eating Boca burgers before they were mainstream. Mom bought some junk for scrawny Jonny which I hoarded and ate with shame in dark closets while shunning my well intentioned Snack Wells supply (I bet I could compete in a contest involving shoving a Jelly Roll into your mouth in record time), but there was never overt bad for you food at my disposal. One cannot remain sheltered forever though and there will always be birthday parties, and sleepovers and as you get older it turns into birthday parties with wine and pasta instead of pop and pizza. Both are fabulously fun and dangerously detrimental to a diet.



I think of it like being a zombie. You never realized how good something tasted that was bad for you until you try it. Blissful ignorance if you will. Then after that first time someone told you that pizza taste better dipped in ranch dressing all you can do is walk around crying "brains". As my Aunt Marcy would say it is a slippery slope and it does not take a giant leap in circumstance to go from putting too much bacon on your salad at a salad bar to putting to many egg rolls on your plate at a Chinese buffet. In fact I am going to go ahead and compare bacon to any other gateway drug, it leads to nothing good except perhaps delicious B.L.T's, carbonara's and the perfect thing to dip in syrup at breakfast time.

SEE!

See how easy it is to go from being a health nut to a fantasizing fat kid?!? Is this just me or does everyone have this problem. It is clear that I have food issues, which I think is comparable to other girls who have "bad boy" complexes. Instead of liking the guy in the leather jacket and mussed hair, I fall in love with the Sergio's boys who bring me chimichangas.


*Just as a momentary point of clarification does recognizing and acknowledging that I do this make it more or less disturbing? *


So here I am now at the realization that I am not treating my body very well and need to get back on track. It is not to look good in a bikini because that ship sailed for me when I was five years old, it is more about just being more confident in my appearance. Ultimately I think I would like to be able to wear my prom dress again, because it is vintage and pretty. Gus and I have (re) joined Weight Watchers and I am doing it online because the nearest meeting is in, you guessed it KENTUCKY. Bananas.


I am going to keep you updated on my progress but I don't want this to be a talking point when I see you. I don't want you to look me up and down and say to yourself "gee she looks the same", or "did she always have that many chins?". I don't want this revelation to be a point of contention. If I see you and I am dipping curly fries in ranch then so be it. I do not give you the right to judge or criticize because at the time I clearly thought it was a good idea, and I am the only one responsible for making sure my zipper goes all the way to the top without needing some form of hardware to assist. I hate when people express the desire to change themselves and then their actions are nit picked and derided, it really is a lifestyle and nothing happens overnight. Not saying you guys would do that to me, but I think the second you tell yourself you can't have something (Chick-Fil-A cookies and cream milk shake) then all you do is want that thing even more.


I am telling you about my past and present and hopes for the future so that I can know in the back of my mind that I am accountable for my decisions and there are people out there who wish me success. It is more than a little ironic though that Hermie is out here studying the affects of marijuana on the brain and all this research was just done linking fatty foods to the same pleasure responses that drug addicts get. Interesting indeed. I will try to keep you better posted, while maintaining the honesty and integrity of my thoughts and real time responses. For now I think it would be fun if you guys wrote in the comment box what your food addictions are, your comfort foods if you will. It would make me feel better to know that as the former ousted leader of the Fat Kids Club (I have since been overthrown by my super skinny brother) that there are other recovering addicts out there just like me.


Puff, puff, pass y'all :)