Christmas wishes!

So, its Thanksgiving, but I am thinking of Christmas. Jeff and I are in Iowa at the moment sitting around the living room watching Home Alone movies (Jeff's dad's personal favorite) and digesting our dinner with his family. Its been pretty fun so far. Yesterday I went Christmas shopping downtown and found a few fun things. More than anything I like getting my closest family and friends presents. If you'd like to know my personal Christmas list, (and even if you didn't) I am going to post it here. These are just a few things that popped up into my head today...

An orange throw for my room

New dinnerwear and bowls

Soap and Paper drawer liner paper
IPod Nano 4th Gen. Armband

A new robe

MOVIE TIME!

When it starts getting cold outside I generally go through a few weeks of sadness and moodiness due to the sun going away so early and missing my vitamin D time outside doing fun things. There are, though, two things I get excited about:

1) The clothes. I really like to layer and wear boots, so colder weather suits me (plus I hate how I look in shorts).
2) Movies! I love Oscar season when all the good movies start coming out that actually mean something. So far I have seen Changeling and Rachel Getting Married, neither were amazing or anything-- but I can't wait to see (and I'm almost embarrassed to say the first one, but what can I say, I work with Middle Schoolers all day) Twilight, MILK, Benjamin Button, and Man on Wire at the Moxie. Speaking of new theaters, the new Hollywood Theater downtown is pretty sweet. Its nice to have it in the area of where I spend all of my free time anyway. More exciting though is the new Moxie opening up in the Wilhoit Plaza. After some SKINGO action tonight, Jeff and I stopped by the new building to talk to Dan and check out how the progress is going with the theater. Of course, I have a soft spot for the Moxie because Jeff and I got ENGAGED there, (if you don't know the story you should-- Jeff is great at creating inventive ways to do things) but I just love the types of films that they show.
Oh, and one last point about movies, I know its MONTHS away, but I can't wait to go to the True False Film Festival in Columbia in March! Since Jeff and I started going two years ago we are addicted! Its amaaaazing.

So, on to deeper things, specifically (and hopefully) deep sleep. Enjoy your week, and go see some movies!

"Barack is the new black"

Jenn brought something home with her from Iceland especially for me: a free newspaper with Barack Obama on the cover with the headline above splashed above... there was a tagline at the bottom saying:

Barack Obama's call for change resonates as deeply in Europe as it does in the U.S. THe new leader of the free world is seen as a unifying symbol, capable of rebuilding the bridges that the Bush administration burned down in the last eight years. Hope has been restored.

Well, I was intrigued. I got home tonight and started reading the article, written by an American, no doubt. He starts the article by relating American literature to America's place in the world. It, like American literature, is described by the author like this:

To be American as long as I've been alive has been to be at the top of a fading, maniacal empire, and to have been hyper-conscious of it.

My husband says all the time that one of his number one reasons for supporting Obama is to help us regain respect in the world, and I tend to agree. I remember going to Paris and Amsterdam in 2004 (or 2005?) to visit a friend studying abroad and I was taken back by all the American-haters, more specifically, Bush-haters, out there.
I don't really have much else to say about the article... I don't think one man can truly "save" us and do as much as he's being built up to be able to do, but wouldn't it be nice?

Several things

I had a bad week and I'm so glad its over. I finally went to see the "Sensi" (Jeff and I see a guy that does alternative therapy-- healing-- accupressure that we call the "sensi") yesterday and he helped my leg a lot. He gave me some Dit Da Jao to take away inflammation. It smells horrible but is helping.
In other news:
I am at Cafe Rendezvous and just finished working on a big assignment for my Internship class. Glad thats done with. Its cozy in here. I tend to prefer Coffee Ethic for coffee, but they have good food here.
The new downtown movie theater opened today which I walked into-- it seems cool. I might go see Changeling there tomorrow night.
Its getting colder out which I like at the moment.
There is a Mystery Hour tonight.
I've been thinking about what I want for Christmas.
I'm glad the elections are over.
I watched my dad's dog Lilly play with Kesha's new pup Bosco forever last night and that was fun.
I slept in today and spent most of my afternoon in bed.
I am listening to a really good song by Iron and Wine.

That's about it.

OUCH!

So I sprained/tore/pulled-- SOMETHING-- my calf muscle in my left leg running the other day. No wonder it hurt (see post below). Yesterday it wasn't too bad, but as the day wore on and into today it just got worse! IB Profin and icing it hasn't helped too much. Accoring to WebMD its just going to take time to heal. Great. Another injury. Lovely.

I took the first step...

So today I went running for the first time in four and a half months b/c I called my doc and he cleared me to go for it. I've been bumming about my post-surgery in-the-middle-of craziness weight gain while all of my friends are their most svelte selves. So, I've decided to try and lose 5 pounds by Christmas. I'm not one to diet, or really care THAT much, but something's gotta give. Especially since I found out today that I cannot wear 1/2 of my wardrobe to work anymore... but that's a different story not to be shared on the Internet...

So, I went running-- back to that-- it was awful! Good god I know why people who don't run hate it. It was so hard. By about 1/2 a mile my left calf muscle turned into a 5 pound ball and my feet went to lead. I'm serious, I must have looked like I was trying to hobble-run (a new trend I'm starting) down Dollison street between Seminole and Cherokee. Around a mile into it I gave in and stopped. I ran a few more times after that, only to stop 50 feet later, then start up again, etc. Geeze. On top of it all I usually get sore the day AFTER a tough workout, but I have been sore all night.

The rest of my day was pretty crummy. Lots of embarrassing events one right after another. I am being humbled each day by my lack of ability to keep up with myself. I sorta want to stare up into heaven and say to God, "OK, OK! I'm done with growing! Put me back to my I-can-handle-everything-myself-thank-you self!"

Oh, but I won't give up. Tomorrow is a new day (VOTING DAY!) and I have five pounds to lose...

I was 20 feet away from (hopefully) the next president!

I am SO glad that Jeff and I have gotten involved in the local Obama effort this week. First we went canvassing on Wednesday, then for 1/2 of today, and it really paid off-- we got to get into the Obama rally tonight in Springfield ahead of most everyone else and be freakin' 20 feet from the stage! It was AMAZING watching the whole Obama family interact, and then hear Obama talk for quite a while about the issues.



He started off by talking about how Dick Cheney endorsed Mcain today by taking to the campaign trail-- sorta bashing that whole deal to bring home the point that there will be "four more years of the same..." blah blah blah-- I sort of care (because i don't think the republican's view of trickling down money works), but most of all I care about having a strong leader in the white house who talks a lot about bringing people together. He got to that point at the very end, after he gave the same speech I heard on NPR the other morning (its a really good one) going over the issues and what he plans to do. (He throws in a good line about cutting taxes for 99.9% of all plumbers, btw.) But then he got to the good stuff-- talking about how good Americans are, and how its time for us to ban together to be good to each other, serve one another, get involved in community service, be good parents, etc. etc. That is one thing I respect about the Republican base-- their sense of values and how important it is to emphasize that families take responsibilty to do good because the government cannot do it alone.-- and I am so happy to support a candidate that believes in putting responsibility and accountability in the white house as well as in the family home.

Anyway, enough preaching, it was awesome. It feels historical. Three days before the election I got to see him. Close.