Wednesday, November 22, 2017

Legwork and Life, week of 11/22/17

I feel somewhat ill today because of my period, but that's about the only bad thing to report this week.  Actually, I'm expecting this bout of annoyance with my birth sex to be shorter and less painful than usual due to my new exercise schedule, which will be, at minimum, 2 days a week with at least 45 minutes of sustained exercise.  This is due entirely to my parents, who both exercise religiously and like to see me.  Their new home, the retirement complex I mentioned awhile ago, has an attached gym.  It's not the fanciest, most up-to-date exercise area I've ever seen, but the equipment seems to be serviceable, which is all you really need.

Anyway, I've reinstated my habit of using a recumbent bicycle for half an hour or so, while reading a book or playing a video game or fiddling with my Rubik's cube.  I tend to tack on 10-15 minutes of exercise on the elliptical machine after that, then a couple of the strength training machines.  This is more or less one of the exercise patterns I developed back in college, when I had a gym within a 5 minute walk of where I lived.  I really miss having that, honestly...

Last week I mentioned being on the fence about what to do for my graduating hairdresser/beauty student/person-friend.  She's leaving Grand Rapids for her dream job in Chicago, which is awesome for her and sad for me.  We sort've became friends over the last few months, and she's responsible for my hair being all blue and short and such.  I'd been kicking around the idea of making her graduation a little more graduation-y.  I guess the only celebration they do at the school is people saying goodbye to you when you clock out for the last time.  No cake.  No celebration.  No party.

That's boring and dumb, so I bought a chocolate cake, a trio of balloons, and a card.  I don't feel the best and would rather stay in and be miserable where it's warm and cozy, but she's only graduating once, so I'm just going to have to take painkillers and suck it up.  I'm not really sure how it's going to go, since the entire invitation was, "I graduate at 8pm on ________, you're welcome to come if you'd like!"  But I figure at minimum, I can congratulate her, give her a hug, hand her the cake, card, and balloons, and tell her to make the world her oyster.  Some of her family will also be there, so I'm figuring they'll probably want to go off and do family stuff, and I won't be invited.  Which is fine, particularly considering my state of pain/illness. 

In other food-related news, Thanksgiving is coming.  Conveniently for me, my parents are now 5 minutes away from where I live, so we're getting together and dragging Grandma over and having a nice family meal.  Chris and I will be responsible for making fancy-ish green beans, and riced potatoes (not mashed because Mom and Chris both have issues with dairy).  Chris is also thinking about making some of his rosemary bread, which is quite good, and we'll probably bring a dish of unsweetened applesauce as well.

Meanwhile, Mom and Dad are going to handle the turkey, pies, appetizers, cranberry sauce, and a different vegetable or something like that.  I think we're mostly going to try not to eat until we all go into food comas, but it's Thanksgiving, having an abundance of food is traditional.  It should be a nice meal, though, since Mom and Dad have managed to unpack and put away enough stuff to make room for people milling around and such.  And they have couches and plenty of chairs and such, unlike our place.  Also unlike our place, their apartment complex has elevators, which makes it much more friendly for my grandmother to visit.

All told, I'm looking forward to it. I just need to make sure the blog doesn't fall by the wayside in all the food preparations... 

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