Making Better Choices: Just kidding! It just looks that way.

I have been trying to make better life decisions, so I started eating Greek yogurt. However, I stopped eating real fruits and vegetables. Whatever, there are bits of fruit at the bottom of each Chobani yogurt-thing. The situation is pretty much a solid diet of yogurt, Luna bars, cheese, meat, and pasta. My bowels are like, "seriously?" And in response, I say, "look, I drink enough coffee to make up for all the fiber I am not eating."

Fine, nutrition still needs to be tamed. Despite my poor food choices, I am still exercising! I might not go to the gym as much as I used to, but I am taking a Zumba class once a week with my friend Julian. I did not go this week though... Anyway, Julian and I are going to be Zumba masters one day. I cannot follow along with all the moves, but if I flap my arms and spin around when feeling lost I look Zumbatic enough. While humiliating 40-60% of the time, Zumba is a great deal of fun. Our instructor even plays songs that have the word "zumba" in it; just in case someone forgets why she is there (a lot of old ladies in this class, by the way).

My body is not the only thing getting into awesome shape. My brain is doing okay as well. Olivia and I have been throwing a lot of ratchet parties... Yes, it is true. She and I party almost every single weekend. Sometimes we party during the week. We will often party for hours... like seven. Seven hours of partying sometimes. "What kind of parties?" you ask.

Study Parties!!! Olivia, who is obviously French from the accurate picture above, is a terrific study party buddy. We like to sit across from each other and work. We also like to sit across from each other and eat lunch in between morning work and afternoon work. For extra fun, we like to go to the movies and watch films that you probably have never heard of before because these films do not believe in advertising. Seriously, why don't any of these producers believe in posters? Still, they are usually majorly super nice and magical. I know that if left to my own devices I would only watch romantic comedies and romantic comedies in 3D.

Sometimes we need more than great friends, exercise, study parties, and yogurt. I needed to take care of my "spiritual self". My spiritual self was just screaming for a serious make-over. Just kidding, I really did not know that I had a "spiritual self" until James and I made a pilgrimage seventy blocks south to Radio City where Oprah is kept. Yes, James and I consulted Oprah for some life advice and a self-esteem boost.

Seriously, I went to go see Oprah. She told me that I needed to feed my spiritual self and not just my hungry self. Oprah said a lot of things that day. I know she was speaking English, but I was pretty much lost for all 2.5 hours. Many of these things just ended up jumbling together--"transcendence", "energy", "karma", "meditation", something about the past and the future and how neither is now, "judgement", etc. Regardless of how little I learned about my spiritual self that day, there was one thing I did gain...

Oprah Friendship. Oprah and I are best friends now. She learned how cool I was and wanted to read my autobiography. I didn't have a copy on me that day, so she was all like, "yeah, no worries, maybe I can pick it up from you one day when we go shopping together and do girl stuff together, like facials and whatever. I will put your book on the book club reading list and you will become famous and I will scream your name like, Caaaattthhhhheeeeerrrrrinnnnnnnneeeee!" Yes, I am awesome... Eh, well, not really. Oprah and I are not really friends. I mean, in my heart she is my friend, but that is not a real place because two people cannot sit down inside my heart and have tea. These people would have to kill me first or something, but if I am one of the people then it really is impossible. So, yeah, Oprah is not really my friend. I did not get to hold her hand as depicted in the image above. No one is allowed to touch Oprah anyway. She is made of Phoenix feathers, angel nail clippings, and that warm feeling you get when you step into Saks--mortals cannot handle that kind of tactile experience.

Before I end this post, I have one more thing to share. Here is a fun game...

Guess!

Guess!

Guess!

I might be getting...

My Charmed New England Life: Too Much Nature. Gross.

New England, the birthplace of witches, lobster, Fall-time trees, and deadly animals. I kind of get to live here! yay... Moving beyond the ghosts and rats that live in my walls, there is way too much nature out here and someone should do something about this problem. Nature is freakin' everywhere and I can't seem to get rid of it--there is only so much of it I can eat. While the rats and ghosts may just be ontologically real, the family of centipedes living in my bathroom sink is materially for-realz-for-realz. Centipedes live in my sink tubes and at night they crawl out, staying in the basin until morning. They scare the crap out of me, so before I go to bed I close the bathroom drain to avoid this:

My campus seems to be filled with the nature as well. The other day a gaggle of geese (gaggle, right? Bevy? Eh) landed in front of the athletics center. I wanted to chase them, but I had to save all of my running energy for the elliptical. Prior to the geese encounter, I saw a HAWK! SQUAWK! It was raining out or something and from the graduate lounge window I saw a beautiful hawk the size of a three-year-old human. It was just chillin' on the lawn like, "eh... no big deal. I'm just a hawk chillin'". I tried to exhort my peers to share the enthusiasm, to absorb the glory of this magnificent bird--no, just kidding, I tried to get them to come outside to watch me chase it. Only one friend followed me out. The hawk was even more enchanting without a glass window dividing us. I felt such a connection to it. It was my spirit animal, my Hedwig.

I debated whether or not to chase it. After all, it was a pretty flippin' large bird with talons and a beak. Before I was able to make up my mind

it kind of flew at me and I grabbed a girl with crutches to use her body as a shield (I learned how to do this in Civil War reenactment games during 7th grade). Yup, I am a terrible person. Thankfully, the hawk decided to land in a tree instead of my face. All was well again in my charmed New England life.
Next time I decide to chase a large bird I am going to chase a turkey because... YES there are wild turkeys that roam free around New England! They are bigger than hawks.

I asked one of my new school friends if it would be possible to have her drive me around town so I can hunt turkeys from the passenger seat. She said no. Well, until I can find a gamely person with a car, I am going to enjoy the taste of New England nature the legal way.

I ate chips.

It is currently 4:00 pm and my belly is full of chips. I bought the big bag thinking that my snacktimes will be taken care of for the next four days. Nope.