Elizabeth

madlori @ 01:16 pm: Happy Things
Today's List of Happy Things!

1. Raspberry Zinger tea. Mmmmmmm tea.

2. The song "Grace Kelly" by Mika. It's always a party in my office when this song comes up on the MadPod.

3. Birthday party tonight for Jessimi! Yay!

4. Taking clothing to the consignment store = win because of room in closet + potential moola.

5. I am happy with the winner of SYTYCD (trying to be spoiler-free). I would have been perhaps slightly more happy with the 2nd place finisher (who was so damn good that it sometimes hurt to watch him because he was painfully achingly good), but the show has a looooong history of the better dancer taking second place to a dancer who is also great but more diverse/personable. Travis Wall and Danny Tidwell both finished second too, remember. There actually...I don't think there has been a season in which the BEST dancer won, although season 5 came close. Man, this season flew by though, didn't it? Now I anticipate the next season when BILLY BELL WILL PWN YOU ALL. I have confidence in this. He better frickin show up, is all I'm sayin.

6. After the consignment store but before the birthday party I will have about an hour to kill, so I plan to go to the tea salon next door to the consignment store, have some of their KILLER tea and read a book on my Kindle. I'm absurdly excited about this plan.

Tags: books: reading, music: songs, personal: clothes, toys: kindle, tv: reality

madlori @ 09:52 am: Sometimes the world is funny.
This morning coming out of Starbucks, I saw that a car had pulled up next to mine and a young couple were getting out, so I couldn't get to my driver's door right away. I stood and waited for them. The woman was quite laboriously hauling herself out of the passenger side with some difficulty. That, coupled with the fact that there's an OB/GYN office two doors down from the Starbucks, led me and my Holmesian intellect to deduce that the woman was pregnant. She closed the car door and I saw that yes, she was probably eight months' pregnant.

"Sorry," she says, smiling at me.

"No problem," sez I. "You've got the ultimate excuse for everything right now."

She laughed. Her husband goes, "Don't say that!"

hee.

Last night on the way home I stopped at CVS because I needed moisturizer and eye makeup remover. When I came out, there was a large van parked next to my car (no, there wasn't a serial killer in it). I did a double take as I approached because a large Schnauzer was sitting straight up in the driver's seat, looking right out the windshield, and it looked eerily like he was about to start up the van and drive away.

hee.

Tags: daily life: humor

icystormz @ 04:00 pm: More exam procrastinating
There's this commercial for legal help that is shown all the time on NBC and their phone number is 444-4444. Obviously it's designed so that it's easy to remember and everything, but my mom made a hilarious comment the other day. As soon as she saw it, she practically shouted "NO CHINESE ARE GOING TO CALL YOU!" because the number 4 is bad luck (it sounds like the character for "death"). Add to the fact that their pitch is "If you were injured in a car accident, call us" so not only were you hurt, but you're going to die if you call them XD.

I know it's one of those incidents where it's funny only if you were there, but i still laugh whenever the commercial comes on.

Tags: family, hilarity, randomosity

madlori @ 12:48 pm: Hangars-on
Today, there need to be hangars. Lots and lots of hangars. I'm taking a big load of clothes to the consignment store tomorrow and they need to be on hangars, the plastic kind like they use in stores. I'm thinking Big Lots. I think I'm also going to go back to Kohl's (where everything was on MEGA SALE last night) and get a holiday sweater. They had some really nice ones for $20. Not too cheesy.

Today is also Awesome Shoe Day.



That is all.

Tags: lifestyle: clothes, lifestyle: shopping

madlori @ 10:36 pm: Things I've Learned at the Gym
For the last four days, my mother has been doing Mad Holiday Baking Frenzy. Don't ask me how she manages to bake like twenty dozen cookies, ten different kinds, in an RV kitchen. She's hardcore like that.

My dad has been oh so helpfully posting pictures of the baking. Because that is what he does.

Yeah, those posts are kinda like torture. No, scratch that...they're EXACTLY like torture.

Instead of dwelling upon delicious delicious cookies I cannot eat I will post this list of

Things I've Learned At The Gym

1. Whatever you do, don't judge what you're doing against what other people are doing. Do what you gotta do. You're the one living in your body.

2. Some people come to the gym in carefully coordinated workout outfits with full makeup and perfect hair. I don't understand these people. I can't stand to work out in makeup, I take it off before I go, and my hair goes back in a headband. I wear old too-big t-shirts and track pants.

3. The gym has a smell. Like school has a smell and libraries have a smell. Not a bad smell, but an immediately identifiable smell. Like rubber sneaker soles and chlorine.

4. Some people come to the gym with their families and work out together. These people are known as "adorable." Tonight I saw a dad and his sixteenish son jogging on neighboring treadmills. They were telling each other jokes. I was ded from cute.

5. Talk to the trainers. They want to help you. That's why they became trainers. And no, they won't a) laugh at you or b) charge you money if you ask about how to properly use the arc trainer.

6. The stair-climber machines are scary. They look like the world's tiniest escalators. There are people who do them backwards. These people are known as "insane."

7. There are all kinds of people at the gym. Fat people, skinny people, old people, young people. Really fit people, not so fit people. People who are there for srs bzness, people who are there for fun. People who keep to themselves. And then there are people who smile at you and say hi in the locker room and make you feel like you belong. These people are known as "awesome."

8. I don't know how anyone works out without music! How do they do all that in silence?? It boggles the mind.

9. I have a favorite treadmill. It's in the first row behind the stepper machines, fourth from the center. If someone is on it when I arrive, I make the irritated face. Other treadmills are jittery. I don't like those.

And this concludes what I have learned so far at the gym.

Tags: lifestyle: food, personal: exercise, personal: parents

madlori @ 10:42 am: Twinkly lights
Me, Dayna and Brian went out looking at Christmas lights last night. Lots of pretty houses, not so many batshit-crazy houses. Here are a couple of the more ostentatious entries.



You can't tell from this photo but there is a moving Ferris wheel in front of the above house.



Tags: events: holidays

madlori @ 11:31 pm: OMGWTFBBQPOLARBEARDEXTER
OMG DEXTER OMFG KSDFFIEWTKFJMDSFHPSDFUAHF;LDSFJPDSIFH

just sayin.

Tags: tv: dexter

icystormz @ 10:49 pm: AWWWWWW
My friend posted this on her Facebook and I HAD to share it:



Tags: hilarity, randomosity

madlori @ 12:23 pm: Cold, wet 5K WIN
I'm back.

My 5K was kind of awesome, akshully. It was cold and wet, yeah. Here are all the cold, wet peoples waiting to start the race.



I started out pretty far back (very few walkers, honestly, most everyone was running...I guess not that many walkers are hardcore enough to come out in this weather) and didn't really move up much, but I don't care. I finished in almost the exact same time I made on the Jingle Bell Run, which I thought was pretty good considering it was RAINING and also I had to watch my footing because sometimes there was slippery slush.

I wasn't that cold. My arms were the coldest part of me for the first twenty minutes or so. My quilty vest kept my chest warm. My legs were never cold at all. My feet got pretty wet and kinda cold but not intolerably so. Otherwise it was fine. The rain was drizzly and constant. I did have to take my glasses off because they were too raindroppy. And hey, I got a mug! They were supposed to be for the first 50 finishers, runners and walkers, but honestly I don't think they HAD 50 walkers. So we all got one.

I think I've figured out why I walk nearly as fast as I can and I always seem slow compared to others. I HAVE SHORT LEGS. The other night at the gym there was this guy next to me walking, and we were walking exactly in step, the exact same pace. I peeked at his display. My speed = 3.4 mph. His speed = 4.2 mph. That's how much shorter my legs are. I'm five foot seven (not short) but I have like a 27 inch inseam. When I'm sitting down I look like I must be six feet tall because I'm all torso. So there's a definite upper limit on how fast I can go on these stumpy legs. Oh well. So I'll never break any land-speed records. Big deal.

I was helped on my way by the special 5K mix I made on the iPod. It's just one hour long, and I've arranged the songs in order of tempo for the pace I want to keep. I'm listing the songs I use under the cut in case anyone's interested or wants to swipe the playlist.

( Lori's 5K Playlist )

Afterward I went to the gym to get in the hot tub. I impressed the hell out of a few people that I'd walked a 5K in this weather (I still had my number pinned to my vest when I went into the locker room). It wasn't until I undressed that I realized how wet I'd really been. My nylon track pants were soaked but I never felt it. My vest was soaked, my tee was soaked, my underarmor shirt was wet and my bra was wet. My socks were wet. I was wet.

But getting in that hot tub was the closest damn thing to a spontaneous orgasm I think I've ever had. WOW that felt good. Another nice thing is that now I know where there's another 5K I can walk. The race today was on a local bike path, out and back, and I can totally walk that anytime.

Then I took myself out for some breakfast with my wild post-hot-tub hair. I'd brought dry clothes to change into, thank goodness. Couple of poached eggs and coffee and now I'm home again. I put all my race clothes right into the laundry.

After this morning's events, one thing is very VERY clear.

I need a new bathing suit. Like whoa.

Oh, and in case you were wondering what a BAMF looks like, THIS is what a BAMF looks like.



Tags: music: listening, personal: exercise

madlori @ 08:28 am: I am so freaking hardcore.
So. It's 8:30 on a Sunday morning.

It's 34 degrees out. And yes, it's raining. Not pouring deluge monsoon raining, but steady drizzle raining.

And I am going out for my 5K.

I have a Champion all-weather wicking shirt underneath a regular cotton long-sleeve tee, over which I will wear and quilty nylon vest. I have cotton leggings over which I will wear nylon track pants. I have wool socks which I will wear inside my old shoes, which are enclosed and leather, instead of my Mizunos which are mesh.

I have a thermal headwrap and thermal gloves.

I also have my bathing suit, so that I can go directly from the race to my gym and sit in the hot tub until my bones thaw out.

Tags: daily life: weather, personal: exercise

madlori @ 06:05 pm: Damn, where are my headphones?
List of People You Don't Want to Sit Near At the Coffeehouse

1. Mostly deaf senior citizens having an animated conversation THIS LOUD.
2. See #1.

madlori @ 04:30 pm: Busy Saturdays
Busy Saturday.

But at least I started it out right. I got a massage. Mmmmmm massage. Then home, shower, dress, run out the door. Ran a couple Christmas-related errands, then off to Target for home stuff and to find a wicking shirt to wear in the RAIN tomorrow for my 5K. Found one. Now I'm at work. Yeah, work. I don't quite have enough vacation days for the trip home I'm doing so I'm working some extra on weekends to make up for it. After I'm done here I have to return a couple of things to Avenue then I'm going to camp out at Scottie's with my laptop and write my movie preview article.

On the way down here to work I realized I hadn't eaten anything, so I called ahead to Bob Evans for a no-chicken cobb salad, small. When I arrived they presented me with THE COBB SALAD THAT ATE MANHATTAN. For serious, yo. Huge cobb salad which I'll be picking at all day, probably.

Today's outfit beneath the cut. People said they liked seeing these so I'll do it from time to time. And yes, I actually put on an intentional outfit and makeup and stuff today, on Saturday. Feeling better about myself makes me want to look as nice as I can when I'm, you know, among people.

( Clothings )

Tags: features: ootd

madlori @ 11:22 am: Rain, rain, go away
Grumble grumble.

According to the weather forecast, it's going to be raining tomorrow morning. I'm signed up for another 5K that starts at 9:00 a.m., when it'll be 37 degrees and...raining.

I just don't know if I can deal with that. Cold, fine. I can handle cold. But cold AND rain? I could wear a poncho but I don't know if there's any clothing that'll keep me warm when I'm also WET.

Fuck. I was looking forward to it. Plus I PAID for it. Am I complete wuss if I bow out of a 5K in the rain?

I made a nice new iTunes playlist for it, too. A perfectly 5K-long playlist that takes me through the appropriate paces.

Grumble grumble.

Tags: daily life: weather, personal: exercise

madlori @ 11:12 am: Cheery Fridays
Happy Friday! I'm in a fantastic mood today. I got a good night's sleep. You know, since I started exercising I've noticed a definite change in my sleeping habits. I go to bed around midnight, I might read for a little while, but I don't have trouble getting up in the morning anymore. I'm never rushing, I always have time to shower and dress with some thought put into it, and dry my hair and all that jazz. I even have time to hit Starbucks for my skinny vanilla latte, which is pretty much breakfast every day. Last Sunday I even got up before 10:00 a.m. And I didn't have to! Quelle horreur!

I'm reading a really...interesting book right now. It's A Reliable Wife by Mark Goolrich. I'm really enjoying it in that I'm looking forward to getting in bed and reading it each night (always the hallmark of a good book) but I don't know how I feel about the writing.

The story is very intentionally dramatic and underpinned with much pontifications about lust and desire. Goolrich's writing is simultaneously restrained and florid. I don't know how else to put it. Taken individually, one sentence might sound like the worst kind of purple prose but all together they have a kind of starkness and frankness that suits the storyline. The characters are ciphers. There's also a lot of head-hopping, which I normally hate but which he pulls off. And there are a number of twists that I did NOT see coming.

Can I just say that I'm STUNNED at the Top Chef winner? ( WHOA )

Oh, when I was talking about that blog post about Zero last night I forgot there was one other thing I wanted to say about Zero. I got a Facebook message from a high school friend, a man, who said he kept forgetting to tell me that he read my book and he loved it, he thought it was exciting and well-written. I wrote back and told him I was stunned...he may very well be the first straight man of my acquaintance or relation to have braved reading my gay romantic thriller. And yes, I'm sure he's straight. Married with a kid and totally straight.

Another weird/cool thing that's happening today. So far here at work, very few people have commented on my weight loss. Really just my friends (of whom I have...well, one, since Becky moved to Delaware). Today, four different people have stopped me in the hall to tell me how great I look and comment on how much weight I've lost. One of them, one of the bevy of middle-aged Eastern European women who work here, told me that she and her friends had been noticing and commenting on it out of my hearing but today I ran into her outside the bathroom and she asked me about it.

It might be what I'm wearing, I'm feeling pretty snazzy in today's outfit. Including the totally awesome thrift-store shoes I got last night.

( What I'm wearing today )

Tags: books: reading, books: zero at the bone, daily life: sleep, lifestyle: clothes, lifestyle: exercise, personal: home friends, personal: weight loss, tv: reality, work: geek central

_lavinia_ @ 01:02 am: Never a Question (Integra/Alucard flopsy), OotD chapter 2 posted
Ummmm I have a bit of catching-up to do.

First, I recently - and finally - posted the second chapter of Out of the Dungeon. Already have several scenes written for the third.

There are, as always, many different scenes floating around my head. I have a couple definite WIPs which I really hope to make more progress on in the near future. I also mean - as ever - to start a series of short random scenes on fanfictionDOTnet, because there's no reason why they shouldn't be posted.

I also posted on integraxalucard a drabble (or flopsy, if you wish), resurrecting something I wrote ages ago. I titled it Never a Question, and it's 235 words. It's all ~*~experimental~*~, or rather just inspired by fated_addiction.

( He introduced her to blood. )

Tags: fanfic, hellsing, integra, integra/alucard, out of the dungeon, wips, writing

madlori @ 09:01 pm: Word of mouth FTMFW
I haven't mentioned much to do with "Zero at the Bone" lately, mostly because there isn't much to say. Work actively proceeds on the sequel although in that way that I do, I have gone and made it complex and difficult to write. Go me.

But i did get a nice Google alert today. It led me to a blog where a reader was talkinga bout books she'd read recently. About Zero she said: "Holy crap. I kept hearing that this book was good, but I really wasn’t prepared for how good it was."

That's good on a number of levels. Not only did she love the book, but she kept hearing it was good. Which means other people were talking about it. And saying it was good. Word of mouth, baby!

Well after my gym vs. couch teeth-pulling gym workout on Tuesday, tonight was a whole different story. I didn't have to talk myself into it, I was ready to go right away and I had the best workout EVER. I felt chock full of energy and I kept up a much higher heart rate than usual. Usually I spent 10 mins or so of the 50-60 mins of walking in zone 3, but tonight I was in zone 3 for like half an hour (fyi zone 1 is warmup, zone 2 is max fat burning, zone 3 is cardio conditioning, zone 4 is anaerobic and zone 5 is about to die of myocardial infarction). I was on FIYAH.

I did score pretty big at the consignment store. I got jeans and two skirts plus the CUTEST SHOES EVER. Plus an appointment to bring in some of my own old clothes that haven't sold on eBay.

Tags: books: zero at the bone, lifestyle: clothes, lifestyle: shopping, personal: exercise

madlori @ 10:35 am: Holiday merriment and lack thereof
I swear, every single store I go into is playing the exact same holiday music station/mix/whatever. If I hear Bing Crosby singing "Mele Kalikimaka" one more f***ing time I may strangle someone with a lei. I should just put my Los Straitjackets Christmas album on my headphones before entering any retail establishment.

People are such drama queens sometimes. I just came back upstairs from filling my thermal carafe with hot water and some people were coming in from outside. They were shaking and gasping like they'd just wandered in from the Yukon. Now, it's 20 degrees out and is snowing lightly-to-moderately with winds about 16 mph, which I agree is cold and wintry, but it's hardly an OMGDEATHBLIZZARD.

This all makes it sound like I'm in some kind of pissy mood this morning which isn't the case at all, I'm in a perfectly fine mood.

One thing about the holiday season, I always have lots more errands to run. I have a couple things to pick up at JoAnn's tonight, and I need to hit the consignment store because once again, out of jeans that fit. Now, this is not a bad problem to have. :-)

One thing is making me very sad, though. I can't find my scarves.

I had a whole bunch of hand-knitted winter scarves. Some of them I made myself, a couple of them my mother made for me. They were in the front hall closet last winter and now they're nowhere to be found. As you may recall pre-surgery I did a whole-house clean-and-reorganize, including that front hall closet. It's possible that they got put in a bag that got sent to Goodwill along with my winter coats that I knew would be too big by the time I'd need them. It's also possible I took them to the basement, but I've looked there. I can't find them.

Sad panda.

Necklace of the Day:



Tags: daily life: errands, events: holidays, features: necklace of the day

madlori @ 01:30 pm: Weatherz
After a lot of talk about Apocalyptic!Snow (which sometimes I think is Weatherman-ese for "any amount of snow over one inch") last night we got...a bunch of rain. It was sleeting a bit but soon turned to just wet. But today it's gorgeous, unseasonably warm...but dropping off fast, oh dear. When I got up it was 55 degrees, but now the Droid informs me that it's down to 42. Hope it doesn't get too cold, I didn't wear my warm coat today and am wearing a dress.

I'd just like to put it out there that it isn't fair that women's undergarments, especially of the "engineered for support/shaping" variety, are SO EXPENSIVE.

Y SO STINGY WITH THE COMMENTS, EL JAY?

Tags: daily life: weather, internet: lj, lifestyle: clothes

madlori @ 10:56 pm: Gym vs. couch, celebrity deathmatch
I did not feel like going to the gym tonight. And yes, some nights I do feel like it. Some days I look forward to it. Today was not that day.

I try to go every other day, although it sometimes happens that two days go by between workouts. It had been two days since my last workout, because I couldn't go last night. So tonight was the night if I wanted to keep up my record of never more than two days going by between workouts.

It was cold. It was rainy/sleety. I had just come from a bra-shopping expedition that did not end to my satisfaction and at the end of which I ended up paying far more for undergarments than is really good for my mood.

I came home and discovered that a skirt I ordered and anticipated getting was WAY too big.

I didn't want to go to the gym. I felt floopy and not energetic at all. I wanted to curl up on the couch and watch my DVRd episodes of Criminal Minds and last Sunday's Dexter. I wanted to make mugs of steaming sugar-free cocoa and cider and have some jerky.

You know what I did? I went to the fucking gym.

I usually come home and right away change out of my daytime clothes, unless I'm going out again. On days I plan to go to the gym, I find it helps me immensely if I get ready to go to the gym straight off even if I'm undecided about it, i.e. put on my workout clothes and take off my makeup (I have this THING against working out in makeup) and put on my shoes. Then if I don't go it makes me feel guilty to sit there in gym clothes and not go to the gym. This is the trick I employed tonight.

So I got in the damn car and strapped on my damn heart rate monitor and drove to the damn gym and got on the damn treadmill and did my damn workout. And no, it didn't feel as good as it usually does. I was glad when it was over. It's not always like that, but tonight, it was. It was a decent workout, not a stellar one. Fifty-six minutes, 523 calories. I try to break 170 bpm for at least a few minutes each session. I didn't quite make that tonight.

But tonight, the couch did not win. There will be nights, I know, when the couch wins. But tonight, in the battle of gym vs. couch...gym won.

So NOW I'm having delicious sugar-free cocoa. Heh.

Tags: personal: exercise

icystormz @ 09:45 pm: There are all sorts of Christmas promotions at Chapters and they're all those "buy $50, save 10%/$5/etc" kind of deals that I wanna take advantage of. The thing is, there's nothing really on my To Read list that I feel I wanna buy, rather than borrow. (I wanna read a bunch of things, but because I read so fast, I usually finish an average book in a couple of days that it's not worth it for me to spend $20+ at a time.

So anyway, the point of this post: can you guys recommend some books for me?

(Aside from HP ^_^) I enjoy historical fiction, or business-type books in the non-fiction realm (a la Freakonomics, How Luxury Lost Its Lustre. Ummmm...Wuthering Heights is one of my favourite books ever.

You know what? I'm contemplating reading the Sookie Stackhouse books, cuz I'm a True Blood fan. Has anyone read them? Are they similar to the show? Better/worse?

Rec away, my friends!

Tags: books