Miscellaneous Monday Musings

We had an unseasonably cold day today considering it is the first week of May. I didn't mind too much since it gave me an excuse to wear my favorite suit to work. It is a purple and black houndstooth suit jacket which I can wear with black suit pants or a silky skirt depending on my mood and the weather. It was nice to get one last wear out of it this year. See you next winter, favorite suit!

I have something exciting to share with you all, I bought my first pair of Toms shoes this past weekend! I know, I know, I am late to the game. My sister has been buying these shoes for years, but I have resisted joining the bandwagon even though it is for a good cause as I never thought their shoes meshed with my unique fashion taste. However, I am happy to say I am a Toms convert thanks to these beauties:

I first fell in love with them awhile back, but I couldn't buy them as I was on a spending freeze for Lent. I think they just LOOK like summer, and I wore them to the Festival of the Arts held in downtown OKC on Saturday and I think they are going to be my go-to shoe this summer. I can't wait!!

I would be remiss without giving a shout-out to my favorite newlyweds, Wills and Kate, *ahem* the Duchess and Duke of Cambridge.

They looked genuinely blissful on their highly anticipated and publicized wedding day and I wish them a long and loving marriage. I hope the media and the public will leave them alone to start their married life together in peace and quiet. This might actually happen, considering there was huge breaking news last night taking the world's spotlight off of their nuptials. The 24-hour news stations are off chasing the next big ratings bonanza.

Between these two major news stories, I am reminded of the amazing effects social media has on our daily lives, but I will save my thoughts for a post later this week.

May Day

Happy May Day! Are you planning to celebrate by dancing around the maypole?

Yeah, me neither.

[Insert obligatory comment about how quickly the year is flying by and how I cannot believe it is already May!]

I celebrated by waking up at a ridiculously early time this morning in order to run the OKC Memorial 5K.

 It was cold. It was raining. It was disorganized chaos.

But it was totally worth it. Although it sounds like a contradiction, the mood of the participants and the crowd was that of excitement and reverence. It felt like we were all part of something larger, with a common goal of remembering and honoring those who were affected by the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building on April 19, 1995.

A particularly poignant memory I have from the race this morning includes a group of several firefighters in their full gear, oxygen tanks and all, walking as a unit, stopped to wait for one member of their group to make a wardrobe adjustment. As I passed them, their cohesiveness intimated a brotherhood that I find evident whenever there is a natural disaster or crisis where their expertise is needed.

The 5K left me feeling motivated to set my sights on running the half-marathon in next year's race. Stay tuned to see if I can do it!

Fear

Did you happen to notice that I started this blog, posted once and waited more than 2 1/2 years to start posting regularly?

It turns out, I started the blog on an impulse and I didn't really think the whole thing through. I quickly realized a blog would mean putting myself out there for the whole world (and the Internets!) to read.

I wasn't ready for that kind of pressure. What if I had nothing to say? What if people thought my blog was boring or worse that I was dumb? What if I offended someone? What if someone I didn't want to read the blog read it? What if no one read it? The list of reasons not to blog was endless.

In the end, the biggest reason I did not blog was my own fear.

This may surprise some people, but I am an insecure person. I do not like to be vulnerable or show my foibles. Also, as a people-pleaser by nature it is hard for me to act without worrying about what others think or how they will react.

However, I am working on my insecurities. I am learning to love myself and working on accepting the things I cannot change about myself as well as exploring some things I would like to change without altering the person I am on the inside.

I am committed to blogging and I hope you will continue reading. I love all of your support!

Miscellaneous Monday Musings

Mondays are never my favorite day of the week, but today was especially bad since it was coming off a nice long three-day holiday weekend.

Sigh.

Enjoyed a nice Easter with the family. Even the Easter Bunny stopped by to say hello or hide her head in shame. You decide:

  

I went to the gym after work today to work off that deee-licious piece of leftover carrot cake I indulged in following lunch. It was totally worth it. If you like carrot cake, check out yesterday's post because that is a seriously good recipe and the icing alone is To. Die. For. I died. It was that good. 

I think carrot cake would be on my "last meal" menu. You know, if I'm ever on death row, and I get to pick a last meal. That carrot cake would be on the menu. Just keep that in mind.

I bought some new nail polish tonight - Buy me a Cameo from Essie:

I think I am going to like it. It has a nice pearly, brownish-pink, neutral color to it that seems to compliment my poor pale skin.

I'll wrap this up by saying that I saw the Adjustment Bureau over the weekend. I liked the movie, it was very thought-provoking and there was some intense chemistry between Matt Damon and Emily Blunt. I swear, Matt Damon will be hot even when he is super-old and gumming his food in the nursing home. Am I right?

Happy Easter!

Just popping in for a quick post. We are headed to an Easter barbecue at my parents' house. The whole family will be enjoying items from the grill and I made dessert:

Carrot cake - recipe from thepioneerwoman

I hope you all have a wonderful Easter! I won't even complain about the rain since we desperately needed it..

Let Your Freak Flag Fly

We are big fans of our local NBA team, the Oklahoma City Thunder. We bought half-season tickets this season and have upgraded to full-season tickets for the 2011-2012 season.

Pre-game festivities outside the arena before Game 1 of the NBA playoffs

Lucky for us, the Thunder made the playoffs this year and we have tickets to all the home playoff games. The atmosphere at these games has been electric and the fans have been absolutely dedicated to making our arena the loudest in the country.

But I digress.

The real purpose of this post is to share a cautionary tale.

At a recent home game, Thunder car flags were given away to all in attendance. Tonight, my husband insisted on putting up one of the car flags on the passenger side of the car to show our support for the team. As I drove down May Avenue, my husband apparently forgot all about the car flag and proceeded to put his window down.

Can you tell where this is going?

As the flag went flying, there was immediate cursing from my husband's side of the car, and I knew exactly what had happened. "Oh, no!" I said. "What should I do? Should I turn around?"

"Quick, quick, turn around!" my husband said. I hurriedly made a U-turn and drove back down the street to see our car flag lying dejectedly in two pieces in the middle of May Avenue. I pulled into the nearest empty lot and my husband jumped out of the car, barely checking to make sure the coast was clear as he rescued the car flag from a certain death sentence.

He ran back to the car with the car flag and we looked at each other only to burst into laughter, high on an adrenaline rush and struck by the absurdity of the situation as well as our reaction to it. It was hilarious thinking about any of the passing motorists that could have seen the car flag go flying and/or our subsequent rescue mission.

Luckily this cautionary tale, has a happy ending. I am happy to report, the car flag seems to be recovering nicely, after a little TLC from my husband. We'll try to take better care of it in the future.

The car flag during happier times - prior to the first playoff game.

P.S. ThunderUP!!

Yoga

After running today, my husband talked me into going to Yoga class tonight. I think he was worried about being the only guy and he wanted me to go with him.

I don't do Yoga regularly, but when I do make the time to go to a class, I find it supremely relaxing.

The stretching is fabulous. The lights are low or even turned off. The instructor has a soothing voice. There is calming music playing in the background.

What I find most relaxing, however, is being unplugged from everything. No television, no computer, no smart phone. Just me and my thoughts. This might sound strange, but I think about nothing and everything all at the same time when I am doing Yoga. I reach a level of relaxation that is rivaled by few other activities in my life. I find it refreshing, and it helps re-fill a well that can become dry in the busy lives we lead.

I should go to Yoga more often.

What kinds of activities do you find relaxing?